Epson has been awarded platinum status for corporate social responsibility by independent assessors EcoVadis.
The platinum rating - established just this year - indicates that Epson was ranked among the top 1% of companies in its industry (ie. as a manufacturer of computers and peripheral equipment). Epson had received a gold rating the previous three years. Gold is awarded to companies that score in the top 5% of companies evaluated.
The EcoVadis assessment focuses on four themes: the environment, labour and human rights, ethics, and sustainable procurement. Epson received an ‘outstanding’ for the environment, as well as high scores for sustainable procurement, labour and human rights, and ethics.
Kazuyoshi Yamamoto, president of Epson Europe, said: “Sustainability is in our DNA - it runs through everything we do. Platinum status means our customers can rest assured that every aspect of our business is independently checked and certified and that we are wholly committed to delivering the highest sustainability standards.”
Epson seeks to leverage its technologies to drive innovations in four areas, including inkjet. It believes its technology can help to shrink environmental impacts, increase productivity, and play a major role in solving societal issues and in achieving the sustainable development goals of the United Nations.
EcoVadis provides an independent platform for evaluating and rating more than 65,000 groups and companies across 200 industries in 160 countries using CSR assessment criteria that are based on the sustainability standards of thousands of external sources such as NGOs, labour unions, international organisations, local governments, and auditing organisations.