Our sustainability achievements and commitments
Our mission is to catalyse action for a net zero carbon future.
We use the power of business to help build a more inclusive and sustainable economy.
As a for-profit enterprise, we’re driven to use our skills, knowledge and services to empower organisations to improve their environmental performance. We also strive to hold ourselves accountable to the same standards we ask of our members.
Annual Impact Reporting
We're pleased to share our impact report for 2022-23 below.
Previous reports
Toitū Envirocare Impact Report FY2022-2023
Contents:
Our impact
Toitū means ‘to actively sustain’.
This report shows how we measure our positive impact on the environment and society against our core values: we shape the future, we are better together, we hold the standard.
This online report is a living document, which we will continue to update with new information as it isavailable.
In FY2022/2023 we have:
| Raised the bar for carbon certification by setting a higher standard for our members | Launched a wellbeing strategy to better support our people | Improved our impact on governance, employees, community, environment and customers, as recognised by an improved B Corp score |
| Started our business transformation, which will lead to having greater influence on reducing global emissions while our business activity is more efficient with fewer emissions | Continued to support employee volunteering initiatives | Expanded our carbon footprint measurement to gain better information about our real emissions so we know what to target in future |
| Reframed our strategy to include more partnering and collaborating with other organisations to create an emissions reduction ecosystem – an important part of our strategy | Assessed our product carbon footprint for carbon certification for the first time to give us greater visibility on our emissions compared to the influence of our services | |
| Reduced emissions in most areas and committed to addressing increased travel emissions compared to previous lows due to COVID-19 |
How we bring about change
Our vision is for all organisations to have a net positive impact on the environment.
Our purpose is to help organisations shift their impact on the climate and environment from negative to positive, at pace.
Our mission is simple: build a better future.
At Toitū we believe in the power of working together to make and sustain positive change. We help organisations in Aotearoa New Zealand reduce their environmental footprint, and encourage them to go even further: to not only minimise their effect on the environment in line with what science requires, but to leave a positive impact on the environment.
Businesses are the primary contributors to the climate crisis. We lead and guide positive change for businesses with our series of science-based environmental programmes. Our team of scientists and business experts have the right experience and education to advise and help businesses reduce their emissions and overcome sustainability challenges. This will benefit both their internal operations and the wider community.
Becoming climate positive and having a positive impact on the planet is within reach of all organisations. This is not just the right and responsible thing to do, it is essential if we wish to stall the predicted devastating impact on our climate and our world – in order to continue to thrive in business and society for generations to come.
Our values
We shape the future
We apply an intergenerational lens: we are stewards and standard bearers at the heart of the climate response ecosystem. We encourage sustainable practices that prioritise long-term stability and balance in the environment, society and economy. We aim to shape the future with simplicity, scale, accessibility and ease, making our expertise and influence available to all.
We are better together
We value connection and relationships: we honour the interconnectedness of all things, respecting the land, past, present, and future generations, and diverse cultures. By exploring the most effective ways of working together, we continuously learn, innovate and achieve positive results – together.
We hold the standard
We strive for excellence: we are experts in our field, dedicated to science, data and best practice, while prioritising our commitment to the environment, our people and our purpose. We hold fast to science and data-centred standards, and our own internal principles. We strive to expand our own and others’ mana, wisdom and knowledge.
Message from our kaiwhakahaere matua – Teressa Betty
Welcome to the climate economy era.
Now that COVID-19 lockdowns and managed isolation are behind us, we hope that the global community can renew their collective efforts to tackle the challenge of climate change. Look at what Aotearoa achieved as a ‘team of 5 million’ by locking down for the safety of the most vulnerable among us. We need to apply the same effort to preserving the health of our planet and protecting generations to come.
Where once upon a time climate action was viewed as a standalone issue, now any economic decision must be made with the climate in mind. Extreme events like flooding and forest fires have devastated lives and communities, and the economic effects are ongoing. We are all operating in a climate economy now.
I joined Toitū in January 2023, at a really pivotal moment for the organisation. We needed to increase our ambition to help our members make a meaningful difference to the climate, and ensure our certifications continue to be science-based and globally recognised.
A key step toward this was launching our Toitū Elevate standard, which increases the requirements our members must fulfil to be carbon certified. We are asking them to set science-aligned targets that aim to restrict climate heating to 1.5°C, measure emissions across their value chains, and increase their advocacy efforts, among other things. We recognise that lifting our standards increases what we ask of our members, but we are committed to helping organisations along this journey to better themselves and the environment.
We also announced we are transitioning out of accepting New Zealand carbon credits across our carbon certification programmes unless they align with international quality requirements. With heightened demand for integrity and transparency, we will only recognise credits from international projects issued by standards that have been assessed as meeting the best practice set out by the Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market.
We also continue our commitment to holding ourselves accountable. Every year we measure our own carbon footprint, and in the year to June 2023 our carbon emissions from air travel increased compared with the previous 12 months. Many organisations have seen a similar trend following the end of COVID-19 restrictions as business travel resumed. However, we have made reductions in other areas, and if we compare like with like, our total footprint has decreased compared with our base year of 2016.
We have expanded the scope of what we measure to reflect our overall impact more accurately, and for the first time we have measured the product footprint of our carbon certification services. More effective measurement means we can better focus our efforts to reduce our emissions. We will review our reduction targets based on what we have learned from this work.
We will continue to refine our certification programmes to align with our commitment to preserve, protect and nurture te taiao, the natural world. Creating a positive impact on the environment and local communities will be at the forefront of any changes we make to our programmes. Collaborating and working together, as well as sharing our hurdles and successes, is vital to ensure our collective achievements as we tackle this momentous challenge.
We shape the future
Introducing Toitū Elevate
How we’ve raised the bar
Our vision is for all organisations to have a net positive impact on the environment. Launched in mid-2023, the Toitū Elevate initiative raises the standard for our collective commitment to driving positive change, fostering innovation and creating a pathway for businesses to thrive while making a meaningful and lasting impact on our planet. It’s the next step in the journey.
For audits starting from mid-2025, all Toitū carbon certified members will need to begin meeting additional requirements, including:
Science-aligned reductions
All members will need to have science-aligned reduction commitments that limit warming to 1.5°C, including setting near-term and long-term targets, and developing pathways to achieve those targets.
Improving adaptation
Members will need to show they are integrating their climate action into business strategy and planning. This is both to ensure adaptation and transition are incorporated into all aspects of their business and to increase resilience and efficiency.
Advocacy and influence
To make the most of their climate action, members will need to ensure it is aligned with broader organisational actions, and will need to review their wider sustainability impact. We encourage organisations to actively communicate their climate action and to use their voice to advance the discussion on how to decarbonise together.
The full requirements of the standard have been published online to make the certification even more accessible than ever – you can view it here.
Carbon impact in action
Celebrating our members’ achievements.
Our members are creating better businesses and a better environment with the help of our science-based, business-tested solutions.
Some organisations have done exceptional work in decarbonising and revolutionising their internal processes to certify their product or organisation.
- Toitū carbonreduce certification focuses on reducing your impacts over time using targets and strategies in line with climate science and lead practice.
- Toitū net carbonzero certification means reducing your impacts, and we help with offsetting your remaining emissions through quality carbon credits to achieve a net zero emissions balance during the transition to a zero emissions future.
- Toitū climate positive certification goes above and beyond to make a positive impact on society, on top of taking meaningful science-led action to decarbonise.
Other organisations have earned Toitū enviromark certification by using our tools to develop a credible environmental management system (EMS) to identify environmental impacts, and to develop plans to prevent or reduce those impacts on a continual basis.
Yealands Wine Group
Yealands Wine Group are Toitū carbonreduce certified having been dedicated to advocacy and lowering carbon emissions across their supply chain with a focus on certification since inception.
Yealands has tackled the challenge of operating as a sustainable business chiefly through the use of innovations in their operations. From small wins such as babydoll sheep reducing the need for fuel-powered lawn mowers to big wins like installing the largest solar array in the country, Yealands has proven they are committed to reducing their impact on the environment.
Silver Fern Farms
Silver Fern Farms (SFF) is New Zealand’s largest red meat producer and exports to 60 countries. SFF has been Toitū carbonreduce certified for over 5 years now and has expanded its membership to include an environmental management system (EMS) for their 14 processing sites – which saw them earning the enviromark diamond certification with Toitū.
SFF launched Net Carbon Zero Angus Beef in New Zealand and the United States in 2021. This allows them to pay farmers directly for the carbon that their farms are sequestering, which encourages greater investment by farmers to plant and protect native wetlands. This is critical given the erasure of over 90% of the country’s wetlands, and with it much of the rare biodiversity restricted to these habitats. SFF are committed to stop using coal completely by 2030.
See Silver Fern Farms success story
Ecotricity
Ecotricity was established to provide 100% renewable energy from hydro, solar and wind projects. They achieved Toitū net carbonzero certification 10 years ago, and have recently elevated their climate action to become Toitū climate positive. Electricity is a major source of carbon emissions in New Zealand, which inspired Ecotricity to become the only provider of Toitū climate positive certified electricity. They now measure and offset all cradle-to-grave lifecycle emissions, including construction items for their renewable plants.
Ecotricity has increased their focus on advocacy and employee engagement, including providing electric vehicle (EV) buyers’ guides, and EV and electric bike subsidies for employees to invest in low carbon transport.
Ecostore
Ecostore exists for the health of their customers and the planet. They have been Toitū net carbonzero certified and Toitū enviromark diamond certified for over 13 years. They have reduced their emissions by changing from forklifts powered by LPG to investing in electric forklifts, and changing their internal processes to be as energy efficient as possible.
Ecostore is also leading the refill model in New Zealand, with refill stations at many supermarkets to reduce plastic waste. Toitū certification has helped them measure emissions and identify opportunities to innovate their processes and reduce emissions.
We hold the standard
We hold ourselves to our own standard.
Our work holds Toitū programme members to account. Just measuring your impact isn’t enough – participating in our programmes requires committing to ongoing improvements, and then achieving them. We undertake multiple efforts to ensure we’re doing good ourselves. Two notable ongoing approaches are our JASANZ accreditation and B Corp certification.
JASANZ Accreditation
As an organisation, our own systems and processes for awarding certification are accredited independently by JASANZ (our regional accreditation body) in accordance with international standards for certifying bodies, including ISO 14065, ISO 14066, ISO 17029 and ISO 17065. JASANZ accreditation provides third party endorsement of our verification and certification services for greenhouse gas assertions. The Toitū net carbonzero and carbonreduce programmes were the world’s first to be accredited under ISO 14065, first accredited in 2009, and have maintained that accreditation under JASANZ ever since, including additional standards and requirements over the years. ISO 14065 specifies principles and requirements for bodies that undertake validation or verification of greenhouse gas (GHG) assertions. JASANZ is a member of the International Accreditation Forum (IAF). The International Accreditation Forum (IAF) is a worldwide association of accreditation bodies and other bodies interested in conformity assessment in the fields of management systems, products, processes, services, personnel, validation and verification and other similar programmes of conformity assessment. Their primary function is to develop a single worldwide programme of conformity assessment which reduces risk for businesses and their customers by assuring them that accredited certificates and validation and verification statements may be relied upon.
Improving our B Corp score
Being a B Corp organisation is our own way of being accountable. As a certifying body, we can’t certify ourselves, so seeking independent endorsement shows our commitment to the standards we ask others to meet. We also measure our own carbon footprint every year and have the results independently verified, alongside our climate performance achievements and commitments; we seek to be equivalent to Toitū climate positive, but do not claim to be certified.
Being a B Corp supports our ambition for environmental regeneration and economic sustainability.
We have been a B Corp since 2019 and were recertified in 2022. The recertification process is done every three years to benchmark, improve and celebrate the impact of B Corps.
The work we have put in since the initial certification has really paid off – our score increased from 82 to 106.8 in our 2022 audit. The score increased across all five impact areas (governance, workers, community, environment and customers). We are always striving to improve our impact in these areas.
Where we've improved
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Expanding our carbon measurement
Better data is key to reducing emissions.
- The number of types of emissions we measure has increased.
- We now include emissions from purchased goods and services.
- Air travel emissions have increased compared with our 2022 report, but is still lower than our starting point in 2016.
- Emissions have dropped in all other areas compared with 2022.
- We are on track to meet our 2030 targets.
Toitū’s overall emissions footprint looked very different in the year to 30 June 2023 compared to the previous 12 months. In 2023, we captured and reported more data in line with the new Toitū Elevate standards.
For the first time, we captured data on purchased goods and services as well as more detail on employee commuting, and we included recycled waste and food waste alongside data on waste to landfill. Our measured emissions therefore look significantly higher, but these largely reflect our actual emissions more accurately. The one area where real emissions increased was air travel with a return to activity at levels closer to ‘business as usual’ compared with 2022.
Toitū’s total emissions for FY22/23 is 259.95 tCO2e.
The product footprint of our carbon certification services is 119.5tCO2e, which is the equivalent of 1.325kgCO2e per hour spent to provide these services.
Table Emissions comparison for each financial year broken down by activity, 2016–2023.
Activity | 2016/2017 emissions (tCO2e) | 2021/2022 emissions (tCO2e) | 2022/2023 emissions (tCO2e) | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purchased goods & services (including freight) | 0.19 | 1.22 | 159.87 | The data measures have been expanded using new methods to better reflect actual emissions. |
Air travel | 79.71 | 13.28 | 53.30 | Travel has not reached pre-COVID-19 levels, but has increased from the lockdown years. |
Vehicle travel, including employee commuting (car, bus, taxi, rail, ferry) | 5.00 | 8.22 | 35.10 | The increase is a combination of improved data collection and an increase in staff numbers. |
Working from home | -- | 5.56 | 6.70 | |
Accommodation | 0.62 | 0.95 | 3.78 | Reflects increasing employee numbers. |
Electricity | 2.13 | 3.13 | 1.15 | Reduced due to changing office premises. |
Waste | 0.06 | 0.08 | 0.06 | We now capture more data so have achieved real reductions. |
Total | 87.71 | 32.44 | 259.95 | Without the addition of purchased goods and services, total emissions were 100.09 tonnes. |
Our significant sources
Purchased goods & services
Purchased goods & services was our most significant emissions source for the year, as we expanded the scope of what we quantify.
We estimated our purchased goods and services based on our expenses during the year. We included, among other things, office equipment, leased spaces, contractor’s activities, catering and beverages, and software licences.
We are updating our purchasing policy and surveying suppliers to ensure they align with our low carbon vision, and investigating where we can and can’t influence reductions, and which categories we should prioritise for better data. We can help most organisations we work with to make changes towards a low carbon future.
Air travel
Air travel was Toitū’s second-highest emissions source for the year. Following the end of COVID-19 restrictions and the return to normal for business activities across New Zealand, our travel emissions increased compared with 2022, as employees resumed visiting clients, travelling to other offices and attending conferences to maximise our positive impact.
Most of our client services are provided online to minimise the need for travel. However, our team occasionally needs to visit clients in other locations for project meetings and site visits during verification.
Other air travel was for team meeting days, conferences and training, and a small amount of international air travel to attend conferences overseas. Working together in person is a valued opportunity, especially for many who work remotely or have a team spread out around the motu (island).
These instances of air travel are carefully considered, and only undertaken where crucial relationship building or lessons shared is critical and will ultimately result in lowered emissions over the long term by improving our knowledge base.
We expect travel emissions to fluctuate in the next year or so as the business grows.
Employee commuting and working from home
We’ve trialled two new tools to help us gather more accurate data for emissions from employee commuting and working from home in FY23, and this emerged as Toitū’s third-highest emissions source. The improved data means that the emissions per employee looks higher, but the growth in overall emissions is largely due to a significant increase in employee numbers since our base year.
We offer highly flexible working arrangements to minimise the need for commuting and to support employee wellbeing. Reflecting a highly remote working culture, Toitū employees worked from home on average 168 days in 2023. Despite this, almost 10% of Toitū’s emissions come from employee commuting. Most of these emissions come from car-based travel to and from the Christchurch office, potentially reflecting the limited public transport infrastructure in the city. Still, the majority of Toitū employees walk, cycle or take public transport to get to work.
Emissions reduction targets
We are committed to managing and reducing our emissions in line with our Toitū climate positive programme requirements. We have validated near-term targets under the Science Based Targets initiative.
Our current targets are:
- absolute reduction of Scope 1 & 2 emissions by 74% by 2030
- absolute reduction of Scope 3 business travel (including employee commuting) by 57% by 2030.
Due to increasing the scope of our emissions measurement, we plan to update our Scope 3 targets and have these revalidated by the Science Based Targets initiative. As part of the process we will reassess our plans and targets to see how the business transformation will affect our emissions ‘curve’ – the point at which emissions will peak and start declining.
We have set long-term reduction targets of 90% for the first time. We believe we can do this for Scope 1 and 2 by 2040, and have set a target of 2050 for Scope 3. Our next step will be to work through the formal validation of these targets and the plans to achieve them.
See our full carbon footprint report
Product footprint and our value chain emissions
Leading organisations are increasingly choosing to measure their product footprint which includes their upstream and downstream emissions, also referred to as value chain. In 2023, for the first time we calculated our product footprint for carbon certification. We wanted to provide transparency to clients and the wider public on the result of our services and the climate action being undertaken to reduce it.
The product footprint of our carbon certification services is 119.5 tCO2e, which is 1.325 kgCO2e per hour spent to provide these services.
This exercise still had substantial uncertainty, but it has highlighted the largest areas of emissions where we need to focus for future reductions: travel and energy use for computers and servers. In future, we will collect more precise data and develop this footprint further. It will also inform our business transformation so we can consider the emissions impact of decisions about our software, equipment and tools. The method used to calculate the product footprint includes the life cycle approach, so it does not represent an exact subset of our overall organisational emissions.
Greenhouse Gas Emissions
As the owner and operator of the Toitū net carbonzero certification programme, we do not claim to be Toitū net carbonzero certified. However, we meet all the same requirements as our certified clients. Our emissions inventory is audited annually and we purchase offsets to achieve a neutral emissions balance. We are also working to reduce emissions in line with climate science to achieve net zero emissions. For details of our inventory, reduction efforts and offsets please see the following disclosure statements. Historical disclosures prior to our 2016-17 base year are available upon request. Our third-party verification reports and emissions inventory reports are also available on request.
● Annual statement 2022 to 2023
● Annual statement 2021 to 2022
● Annual statement 2020 to 2021
● Annual statement 2019 to 2020
● Annual statement 2018 to 2019
● Annual statement 2017 to 2018
● Annual statement 2016 to 2017
As part of our carbon management, we are a signatory of the UNFCCC Climate Neutral Now initiative, which focuses on measuring, reducing and offsetting climate impacts. In order to meet our Climate Neutral Now obligations, we have cancelled an additional 30 credits from the UN Clean Development Mechanism projects for the 2020-21 period.
Climate-related risks and opportunities
Overview
What are climate-related risks and opportunities?
Climate change affects all of us, and the impacts will only intensify as global heating continues. Climate-related risks are those that arise from the impacts of a warming climate, as well as those related to the human responses to climate change and our transition responses. Risk assessments aim to understand the nature and level of climate change related risks, as well as opportunities. The assessment process will guide your organisation in how to reduce and respond to these risks, but if done thoughtfully can also highlight opportunities to build resilient operations, new revenue streams, and robust strategies for decades to come.
Understanding climate risk and opportunities enables an organisation to prepare mitigation strategies and identify business opportunities. The process to assess potential scenarios, determine the risks and opportunities ahead, and plan how to manage them will ensure an organisation is much more resilient in years to come. The assessments support risk prioritisation, which can then drive targeted action and investment in adaptation.
Understanding your climate risks and opportunities demonstrates company foresight and resilience to stakeholders and builds your organisation’s brand as a climate leader.
Climate scenarios
Climate change scenarios are a way of describing possible future changes to climate variables and hazards. There are a range of future climate scenarios based on the level of global heating that occurs. The scenarios help guide thinking on the severity and likelihood of impacts on operations, facilities, value chains and communities.
Toitū’s scenario-based approach for this process uses guidance developed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC); we focused on three key scenarios: orderly, disorderly and hot-house world.
Orderly: This is our best-case scenario based on a very stringent pathway and likely limits climate heating to around 1.5C. In this scenario, carbon dioxide emissions decline from 2020, reaching zero by 2100, with methane reducing in half; this scenario also requires negative emissions through removals, such as forest-based sequestration.
Disorderly: This is considered an intermediate scenario, with projected temperature rise of 2 or 2.5C. While it is the most probable scenario, it does depend on very sharp and stringent decarbonisation enacted in the 2030s. In this scenario, carbon dioxide emissions decline from 2045, reaching half (compared to 2050) by 2100, with methane reducing by about 25% compared to projected 2040 levels; this scenario also requires negative emissions through removals, such as forest-based sequestration.
Hot House World: This is taken as our worst-case scenario, resulting in climate heating of 3 or 4C. This scenario would see minimal change to current behaviour and practices, and thus emissions continue to rise throughout the 21st century.
How is Toitū building its climate resilience?
As part of its ongoing climate strategy, including work to align with its own certification standards and comply with other voluntary commitments such as the Climate Leaders Coalitoin Statement of Ambition, Toitū is developing its climate-related risk and opportunities portfolio. This process is ongoing as we work to embed it into our standard risk and strategic processes, including regular review cycles.
Toitū has completed an initial assessment of climate-related risks. The next phase of our project is to workshop that initial risk map with internal and key external stakeholders to validate and iterate the matrix. From there, Toitū will develop plans to minimise risks and maximise the opportunities and build them into our overall climate transition plans, alongside our emissions reduction strategies.
Toitū’s climate-related risks and opportunities
We've pulled together a summary table that provides a summary of our initial assessment, including the key risks and opportunities, potential impacts and our initial rating of these risks under our best-case scenario, an orderly transition that limits heating to 1.5C; the rating applies to the timeframe between now and 2050.
Our first risk assessment considered three main climate scenarios: orderly, disorderly or hot-house world (see above), as well as the current state baseline. While the IPCC scenarios are based on projections out to 2100, for our risk assessment we focused on the decades between now and 2050. We will release our full risk and opportunity assessment as part of our Transition plan following further stakeholder engagement.
We are better together
Enhancing employee wellbeing
If our employees are thriving, then our business will also thrive.
Our goal is to create a workplace that fosters a sense of wellbeing for our employees, and an environment that upholds a sense of mana and personal integrity. We want employees to feel supported and trusted, and to have a sense of fulfilment and purpose. The benefits of this will carry through to our wider relationships with clients, and enable us to do the best we can to help organisations have a net positive impact on the environment.
In June 2023, we launched a new wellbeing strategy. We built upon our existing values framework which is based on the three phases of breath, and aligned to the Toitū Tohu (symbol).
Our wellbeing pillars:
- Our purpose – Toitū – Be actively sustaining
- Breathe out – Hāputa – Be in action
- Breathe in – Hāunu – Be in relationship
- Held breath – Hāpupuri – Be in balance
Our wellbeing journey
Since we began implementing our new wellbeing strategy in July 2023, we have rolled out several initiatives and held events that support our vision for a happy, healthy and thriving workforce. These initiatives support each of our four pillars of wellbeing.
Toitū – Our purpose – Actively sustain
We created a guide that outlines our unique, Toitū-specific approach to wellbeing. We provided an introductory session in October 2023 to share the guide and explain the processes for addressing any wellbeing issues that may arise in the workplace.
We ran culture and wellbeing surveys in May and October 2023 to identify areas for improvement of wellbeing in our workplace.
Breathe out – Hāputa – Be in action
As part of our pillar ‘Hāputa – Be in action’, we gave a wellbeing koha to each employee, we are redesigning our onboarding processes to make the transition to working at Toitū smoother.
Breathe in – Hāunu – Be in relationship
For this pillar, we held team building events such as scavenger hunts. We also focused on cultural celebrations with Matariki workshops – which were rated highly in employee feedback. We started monthly group walks for Toitū employees, as well as Coffee Kōrero, where two employees from different parts of the business are matched to connect and learn from one another.
Held Breath – Hāpupuri – Be in balance
We moved to a new Employee Assistance Provider, Clearhead, which offers online and in-person services. They also hold monthly wellness webinars and provide an app for mental health support, resources and self-assessment linked to preferred learning styles for all employees and contractors. Of the employees who accessed and gave feedback on the self-help platform resources in 2024, 73% said it was helpful. We also ran emotional culture workshops, offered a 12-week mindfulness programme series, and celebrated several ‘weeks’, such as Mental Health Awareness Week, to bring awareness to issues surrounding mental health and wellbeing.
In addition, we provide 22 days of annual leave, plus three additional ‘Toitū’ days to be taken between the Christmas and New Year period, per year for all employees, and the office closed for three weeks over the 2023/24 summer holiday to support active wellbeing at the end of the busy year.
Next steps in 2024
By implementing our wellbeing strategy, we now have a momentum for continuous improvement. The focus for the next six months is on embedding it even more profoundly in our ways of working and to enable our team to do their best work. We will check in on workloads and wellbeing of every employee throughout the rest of the year as we continue to learn how to best meet our team’s wellbeing needs.
Encouraging a culture of volunteering
Being part of our communities.
Our people receive one day of paid leave per financial year to volunteer for a community project as part of our community purpose. In 2023, we increased the paid hours of volunteer leave so that our employees could help the community recover following the devastating impact of Cyclone Gabrielle around parts of the North Island.
- In 2022, 8 employees each spent one day volunteering (8 days total)
- In 2023, 39 employees volunteered (53 days total)
Volunteer stories
Waste reduction
In 2023, we had several volunteer clean-up days across our teams, and the feedback is always the same: ‘Wow, there is so much rubbish lurking in our waterways, parks and beaches that we don’t always see until we really take notice.’
We encourage our team members to get out and pick up rubbish as part of the collective initiatives to help mitigate the global waste crisis, and try to minimise plastics and other harmful materials going into our oceans.
Wetlands on Waiheke
Diana Hawkins, Josh McGlone and Emily Dekkerfrom Toitū headed to Waiheke Island in October 2023 to help the Waiheke Resources Trust & Sustainability Centre with its Love our Wetlands – Waiheke project.
We have lost 90% of New Zealand’s wetlands, which is a huge threat to endangered species of plants, birds and invertebrates that live in these important ecosystems. They also play a significant role in capturing carbon dioxide, maintaining water quality and regulating atmospheric gas.
This project works towards the ecological restoration and protection of seven significant wetland habitats on Waiheke Island. The team spent the day planting native grasses and weeding asparagus fern and honeysuckle – helping to keep the wetland healthy.
Weeding for biodiversity
A team of Toitū volunteers headed to an orchard in Kumeū as part of an initiative by Recreate NZ to increase biodiversity and help local ecosystems thrive. The volunteers spent the day weeding and mulching at the orchard as part of Recreate’s nationwide working bees.
Reclaim Recycling Week – Wellington and Auckland
As well as volunteering, our people take action in other local initiatives and events to promote the values of minimising our impact on the environment as an organisation.
Uttam Floray, of the Auckland office, is pictured here with his Toitū reusable cup, while Kushil Perera recycles responsibly during Reclaim Recycling Week.