Sustainability - why this is now crucial for pharma business leaders?
Whether your business is in early stage drug discovery and R&D or manufacturing, supply, and distribution, every part of the pharma ecosystem is now under increasing pressure to adopt sustainable practices.
If you're a business leader in pharma, there are a lot of issues you are currently facing. One that has risen to the top of agenda is sustainability. VWV's PING Conference on 12 May 2025 will hear about where the sustainability pressures are coming from for you and what opportunities there are, as well as what you can do about it.
Sustainability is a double-edged sword, because if you get it right you can realise even more opportunities. Here are some thoughts as we are now in the final run in to PING.
- NHS England - They're driving the agenda, but they want to engage. If you're not on a pro sustainability path, you'll find it ever harder to supply, but if you are then you have opportunities.
- Mission led staff are driving change. How you attract, retain and inspire employees to better performance is an ever changing thing today.
- If you want money - whether investors or banks lending money, showing sustainability plans is becoming an increasing imperative. Get it right, and money for your business may be prioritised.
- Focusing on supply chains is really important. The bulk of pharma's carbon footprint come from scope 3 emissions (which are emissions that come from upstream or downstream, and not directly your own organisation). It's about 80% of pharma's emissions, in fact.
- Big Pharma is also driving different behaviour across the ecosystem. If you want to collaborate in any way, you will be feeling the pressure to be part of what others in the industry are doing.
- Buildings - Whether you have laboratories, warehouses or offices, your buildings can make a big impact on your carbon footprint. However, sometimes doing more work or moving might actually make the problem worse - it depends, and there are various factors at play.
- AI can help to realise greater opportunities with achieving sustainability. However, generative AI itself can use a lot of resource for the environment - so where's the balance.
- Genuine change and sustainability will not only be a positive thing for the environment but seen as a plus with all of your stakeholders. However, if you shout about it when people think you're not genuine, or even worse there are any faults in your facts and figures - ie greenwashing - your reputation can nosedive.
- There have been some really great collaboration projects in pharma such as the Sustainable Markets Initiative and the Sustainable Healthcare Coalition. That is the key to making a difference - not doing everything just yourself, but working together and learning from each other.
- Consumers / end patients will increasingly be putting direct and indirect pressure on you to do more around sustainability.
- Saving resources or making things more localised can not only be good for the environment, but can also save you money!
- Where are the big wins and lots of little wins? I heard recently that 90% of toothpaste tubes in the US are now made with recyclable material. What can you do to make change?
Hear more about why sustainability matters to pharma now and what to do about it at the 2025 PING Conference
You can hear at the PING Conference from leading speakers on these issues including the Head of Medicines Net Zero at NHS England, Peter Morgan; as well as Director of Planet Mark, Andrew Griffiths; and many others. Aside from opportunities to hear from the speakers, you can mix and mingle with others in the sector and enjoy a relaxed networking dinner and some inspiring entertainment with international stars of the future.