DuPont Sustainability Report: Our Strategy

At DuPont, science and engineering are the foundation of our company and innovation is core to our business and sustainability strategy to create long-term value for our customers. Our sustainability strategy is grounded in our purpose to empower the world with the essential innovations to thrive and inspired by the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs). As a premier multi-industrial company, we embrace the accelerated pace of learning, change, and expectations happening around the world and within our own communities and workforce. Conversations about sustainability are quickly evolving and we are listening and responding, internally and externally, to increase the speed and scale of our actions speed and scale of our actions and impact.

Our sustainability strategy, established in 2019 and renewed in 2021 with input from multiple stakeholders, is built on three pillars: Innovate, Protect, and Empower. We invest across these 3 strategic pillars based on impact, alignment with business priorities, and actions to maximize value and reduce risk. 

3 Strategic Pillars

Innovate for good

The UN SDGs paint a bold vision for a just and sustainable world by 2030 that we all aspire to achieve. Innovate for good is our commitment to use our talent, resources, and innovation expertise to work on important and valuable challenges to make the UN SDG vision reality. Success requires commitment and investment from all companies and unprecedented levels of connection and collaborative innovation across and between sectors. What we do matters, and what we all do together makes an even greater impact. In 2021, we reached out to customers and end users around the world to better understand their needs and create a more focused set of innovation platforms directly linked to solving sustainability challenges in the industries and markets we serve. We recognize the need for agility and urgency in addressing climate change, access to clean water and healthcare, and more sustainable production. We’re responding by building on critical science-based competencies such as lifecycle assessment (LCA), circular design, and green chemistry, and by further embedding sustainability in our enterprise and business innovation strategies. Together, these actions accelerated and increased our innovation value creation potential, aligned to SDGs, with deepened customer insights and specialized capabilities.

Protect people and the planet

The need for protection has never been more evident or urgent than in the last few years. Protecting people from disease, protecting the planet from the challenges of climate change, and protecting and preserving our most precious natural resources are critical to a sustainable future for all. DuPont’s core values reflect our long-held commitment to ensure the safety and health of our employees, contractors, customers, and communities while protecting the planet. These core values are reflected in our sustainability strategy and goals because, ultimately, the most valuable and enduring business outcomes are the ones that enable people and the planet to thrive together. In 2021 we prioritized acting on climate with an 10% reduction in our GHG emissions, completed our Scope 3 inventory, announced our first significant renewable electricity purchase, and joined the RE100 Global Initiative. We advanced our water stewardship goal by joining the Water Resilience Coalition and signing the CEO Water Mandate as well as introducing new innovations and tools to help others with their water stewardship efforts. And, while the ongoing pandemic continued to present health risks and other challenges, our employees continued to deliver strong safety performance in the top 25% of our peer companies.

Empower people to thrive

The empower pillar of our sustainability strategy addresses the needs we have as individuals and collective global communities for health, wellbeing, purpose, opportunity, and connection. It is closely linked to our company purpose to empower the world with the essential innovations to thrive. Foundational in our core values and sustainability strategy is a commitment to treat our employees, customers and partners with professionalism, dignity, and respect, fostering an environment where people can contribute, innovate, and excel. At DuPont, we strive to be an employer of choice, providing employees with professional and personal opportunities and the ability to shape and contribute to our company purpose, strategy, and performance. We pursue initiatives that enhance the health and well-being of our employees, communities, and the world around us. During 2021 we increased our focus on advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion (DE&I), while continuing to support our employees and communities. In our annual survey, 74% of employees agree that DuPont values diverse perspectives, treats employees fairly, and has an inclusive environment. Additionally, 81% of employees report strong manager support for flexibility and hybrid work and 75% believe that DuPont cares about their well-being. And we advanced our community impact by funding more than 450 charitable projects with a focus on basics to thrive, STEM education, and innovations for good across 29 countries in 2021, impacting more than 3.5 million lives since 2020.

2030 Sustainability Goals

Within our three strategic pillars, our nine 2030 Sustainability Goals continue to shape our innovation portfolio, our operations strategy, and our commitment to our people and communities. We designed the goals to be challenging—to provoke technical breakthroughs and new ideas for addressing society’s biggest challenges while also addressing the material sustainability topics most relevant to our businesses. Even as our business and product portfolios evolve, our sustainability strategy and goals remain critical to achieving our future growth. In 2021 we sharpened and advanced strategic actions across all nine goals, while accelerating action on three priority goals: Delivering solutions for global challenges, Acting on climate, and Accelerating diversity, equity, and inclusion. Our other goals are Enabling a circular economy, Innovating safer by design, Leading water stewardship, Delivering world-class health & safety, Cultivating well-being and fulfillment, and Building Thriving Communities.

In 2022 we’ll continue to advance our 2030 Sustainability Goals through the development of business and marketspecific strategies and continued work on KPIs and roadmaps. In order to focus our current and future efforts on the most important issues for our stakeholders, to develop effective management measures and make the right investment choices, we completed actions detailed in the next two sections in 2021. First, we refreshed DuPont’s ESG materiality assessment which affirmed and helped focus actions to advance our sustainability goals and related competencies. Second, we further integrated sustainability and ESG issues with our enterprise risk management process to inform and drive strategic alignment across our global businesses and functions.

Read the full report here.