Long term goals. Long term value.

Who are we?

SF-Filter are the leading distribution brand for mobile and industrial filters. Head-quartered in Switzerland with other warehouses in Austria, Germany and Poland, we serve over 30,000 European customers. Our majority shareholder, Ambienta, joined us in 2016. Ambienta is a top asset manager driven by environmental factors.

SF-Filter contributes positively to a better environment. Our filtration technology removes pollutants in all media while utilising lower energy consumption, reducing environmental impact while striving to respect the highest labour standards and governance principles.

What is ESG?

ESG stands for ‘Environment’, ‘Social’ and ‘Governance’ and is a business philosophy that acknowledges the importance of non-financial areas for both companies, investors and wider society. They do so in five ways:

1. Increasing growth - new opportunities are opening up within the environmental field such as tackling pollution, a field we are already operating in. By positioning ourselves at the forefront, we have the ability to spot and seize any new opportunities that may arise in this arena.
2. Reducing costs - by avoiding excess consumption of energy, water or raw materials we are able to both save precious natural resources and spend less money on our running costs.
3. Complying with legal framework - by strictly  respecting regulatory and legal boundaries, we effectively avoid fines to our customers and legal costs that eat into profitably and negatively impact our reputation.
4. Increasing productivity - with reduced costs and an engaged workforce we make the most of our physical and human resources by creating an attractive work environment.
5. Attracting investment - from partners who follow ESG principles in their decision-making which is an area of substantial growth.  

In turn, a failure in recognising the role of ESG in contemporary business practices has the potential to unnecessarily inflate waste and packaging costs, receive penalties, suffer from poor media coverage, lose good workers, fail to recruit the best staff, lose customers and lose market share to competitors.

Risk management is also an important factor as ESG encourages us to look ahead for  future risks that might have a negative effect on company economics.

SF-Filter and ESG

We want to be open and transparent with our investors, employees, suppliers, customers and the wider society. We appreciate that we have a tangible contribution to make to the environment and its future. We want to continue a thriving business for many years to come, to be a place of employment and producing goods that change and improve people’s lives. It is about SF-Filter becoming an ESG champion.
That drive to incorporate ESG values into our working lives will attract more interest from investors, suppliers and customers who share these goals and will only strengthen our ESG profile. Meanwhile our risk profile will be minimised thanks to a long-term approach to environmental, social and governance factors.

We look to take on our ESG responsibilities in the following three areas:

Environmental

As a distributor of filters, we are in a position to add value to the environment by taking pollutants out of the environment. This positions us both in an area of growth and as leaders in the environmental area rather than followers.  As we seek to move to a net-zero economy, SF-Filter is committed to supporting environmental concerns in the following ways:

Products

• We believe in producing products which – by their nature and purpose - improve the environment through actions such as air, fluid and water filtration that reduces pollution.
• We believe in making products that are energy efficient to reduce our customers’ energy consumption.
• We believe in reducing our unnecessary packaging to reduce energy and material costs and post-use waste.

Production Environment

• We believe in reducing our water consumption both in manufacturing and within our support services.
• We believe in recycling our everyday waste to reduce landfill waste.
• We believe in minimizing our carbon emissions.
• We believe in energy efficiency to reduce production costs.
• We believe that every staff member has a role to play in reducing waste and use of resources.

Social

A company is the sum of its people. Every member of staff has a part to play in fostering the atmosphere of inclusion and mutually supporting their peers. Every member of the staff also has a right to respect and to be listened to. Ultimately, how we interact with people within and outside the company will either accelerate or stifle our growth. Therefore, we strive to provide a fair, open, inclusive work environment which positively supports the communities in which we operate.

Diversity / Equality

• We believe that the wider the talent pool, the better the quality of the candidate. We encourage a diverse range of applicants to apply.
• We believe that a diverse workforce encourages diverse thinking and promotes innovation and growth.
• We believe in equality of opportunity for all staff to go for promotions or training.
• We believe in a safe working environment free of discrimination regardless of ethnic and national origin, class, religion, disability, gender, age, sexual orientation, union membership or political affiliation.  We want our diverse staff to stay and grow with us, adding value.

Human Rights

• We believe in respecting local and international laws on human rights in the supply chain.
• We believe in making sure no child, slave, forced or trafficked labour in our supply chain.
• We believe in monitoring our supply chain, and refusing to engage with suppliers who do not share our ESG aims.

Community relations

• We believe in promoting and participating in activities with the local community that encourage economic, environmental and social development.

Employee engagement

• We believe in listening to our employees at all levels as they are valued and respected.
• We believe in our staff’s right to form and/or join a trade union in order to be represented.
• We believe in rewarding our staff for their performance.

Product safety

• We believe in the right of the consumer to buy safe, quality products that have been tested diligently.
• We believe in delivering customer satisfaction by providing high quality products.

Safety in the workplace

We believe that all workplace incidents and accidents can be prevented.
We believe that everyone has a responsibility to make sure they work safely.
We believe we should watch out for others’ safety in the workplace.

Governance

Corporate Governance is the process and structure that controls a company. It increases company accountability and transparency. When it goes wrong, it opens up the company to many risks such as poor long-term growth and possiblyregulatory censorship/fines. When it goes right, the entire company is motivated, knows and understands its values and are driven to produce efficiently.

• We believe in working for the long term sustainability of the company, society and planet in our decision making rather than focussing on short term gains that yield higher risks.

• We believe in the highest standards of business ethics and integrity in the work we do.

• We believe strongly in anti-corruption measures as we strive for due diligence. Corruption erodes trust and transparency.

• We believe that all employees are responsible with adhering to governance in their daily work.

• We believe that whistle blowers should be able to report unethical behaviour or breaches in governance without fear of punishment. Criminal acts will be reported to the relevant authority.