Environment

Initiatives for Biodiversity Conservation

Initiatives for Biodiversity Conservation

Individuals, companies, communities, and society as a whole are built on "ecosystem services," the blessings bestowed by the natural environment. Ecosystems provide us with oxygen, water, and food without which we cannot survive, as well as shelter and clothing that enrich our lives. And it is "biodiversity" that has kept ecosystems stable since ancient times. However, this biodiversity is rapidly being lost due to global warming, environmental pollution, overexploitation, overfishing, and other factors caused by human activities, and ecosystems are in crisis. If we fail to take action now, the entire society will suffer severe damage in the future due to inability to enjoy ecosystem services, and we will not be able to realize the "sustainable society" that the SDGs are aiming for.

Under these circumstances, following the adoption of the "Kunming-Montreal Framework for Biodiversity" at the 15th Conference of the Parties (COP15) to the Convention on Biological Diversity held in December 2022, the Japanese government adopted the "National Biodiversity Strategy 2023-2030" by a Cabinet decision in March 2023. This strategy sets out the goal of halting and reversing biodiversity loss by 2030 to be nature positive by 2030.

The Mitsuboshi Belting Group has been working to reduce GHG emissions in order to curb global warming, but recognizing that biodiversity loss is a risk of equal importance and urgency to global warming for individuals, companies, communities, and society as a whole, in fiscal 2023 we have taken up “biodiversity conservation" as one of the issues in our materiality: "initiatives for environmental conservation.” We plan to set specific measures and KPIs and implement various activities.

Strategy

The Sustainability Promotion Committee has identified risks and opportunities related to "biodiversity conservation" and assessed their impact on the Mitsuboshi Belting Group's business activities, in accordance with the disclosure framework recommended by the TNFD,*¹ and based on the results of the impact assessment, strategies and targets have been defined.

In addition, as mentioned above, one of the factors threatening biodiversity is "climate change" caused by global warming. Our strategies and targets in this regard are detailed in “Initiatives to Realize a Decarbonized Society.”

・Initiatives to Realize a Decarbonized Society

Relationship between operating regions and ecosystems

First, we surveyed and identified overlaps (points of contact) between the Mitsuboshi Belting Group’s operating regions (from the perspective of product life cycle), and important regions for biodiversity conservation. Specifically, as our operating regions, we selected (1) regions where the Mitsuboshi Belting Group's 14 production sites are located, (2) regions where natural rubber and cotton, which are our raw materials, are produced, and (3) regions where crude oil, which is our raw material and energy source, is produced. For important regions for biodiversity conservation, we selected (1) regions called hotspots,*² where ecosystem integrity is being lost, (2) regions where endangered species need to be protected (AZE sites*³), and (3) high water-stressed regions.*⁴

Our operating regions overlapping with hotspots	Regions where seven domestic production sites are located Regions where four production sites in Thailand, Singapore and Indonesia are located Natural rubber producing regions in Southeast Asia
Our operating regions overlapping with AZE sites	Natural rubber producing regions in Southeast Asia
Our operating regions overlapping with high water-stressed regions	Region where the one production site in India is located Cotton producing regions in India

We recognize that production activities at the Mitsuboshi Belting Group's production sites have a significant impact on their respective local ecosystems, due to water consumption, and environmental pollution caused by wastewater, emissions and waste discharged. We also recognize that in the production of natural rubber, deforestation due to land use has a strong impact on the ecosystem, while in the production of cotton, the water consumption required for cultivation and environmental pollution caused by pesticides have a strong impact on the ecosystem. In particular, issues related to production of natural rubber and cotton have already been taken up as international environmental issues, and several initiatives have been launched to improve them. We believe that these issues should be given the highest priority in the business activities of the Mitsuboshi Belting Group.

※1 The Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) was established in June 2021 by four organizations: the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), the United Nations Environment and Development Finance Initiative (UNEP FI), and Global Canopy (NGO) to encourage companies to appropriately disclose financial information related to biodiversity conservation efforts.
※2 A hotspot is a region with more than 1,500 species of endemic vascular plants (seed plants and ferns), and where more than 70% of the native ecosystem has been altered.
※3 An AZE site is an area that holds the last remaining populations of 1,483 of the Earth’s most threatened species, as disclosed by the Alliance for Zero Extinction biodiversity initiative.
※4 High water-stressed regions: Regions with a baseline water stress level that is classified as "extremely high” in the World Resource Institute’s Aqueduct Water Risk Atlas.

Risks and opportunities, scenario analysis, and strategy

We have identified risks and opportunities by taking into consideration the relationship between the regions in which the Mitsuboshi Belting Group operates and the important biodiversity regions, as well as the scenarios shown in Table 1 below. Table 2 summarizes the identified risks and opportunities and measures taken to address them. By examining information obtained from published biodiversity-related reports and the World Resource Institute's Aqueduct, the Mitsuboshi Belting Group has created scenarios that describe what the natural environment and social situations will look like in 2030 and 2050.

Table 1: Near-future scenarios from the biodiversity conservation perspective

	Biodiversity conservation scenario	Biodiversity loss scenario
2030	Biodiversity conservation scenario Environmental destruction by humans stops and the environment begins to repair itself. Disasters caused by deforestation and climate change decrease compared to current levels. Strict environmental assessments are conducted for all industrial land developments. Biodiversity recovers, but water stress is exacerbated by other social factors. Demand for more expensive eco-friendly products becomes mainstream. Ecosystem services are supplied stably, and individuals, companies, communities, and societies that utilize them are stabilized.	Biodiversity loss scenario Areas important for biodiversity conservation expand compared to the present. The scale of climate change-derived disasters is amplified by environmental destruction. Land development expands with the same inadequate environmental assessments as now. Coupled with loss of biodiversity, water stress is further exacerbated. Eco-friendly products are being removed from the market due to price competition. The provision of ecosystem services becomes unstable, and shortages of goods, price increases, regional conflicts, etc. increase from the current levels.
2050	Biodiversity conservation scenario Self-restoration of the environment progresses and biodiversity becomes richer than it is now. Disasters caused by deforestation and climate change decrease compared to 2030. Strict environmental assessments are conducted for all industrial land developments. Biodiversity recovers, but water stress is exacerbated by other social factors. Demand for more expensive eco-friendly products becomes mainstream. Ecosystem services are supplied stably, and individuals, companies, communities, and societies that utilize them are stabilized.	Biodiversity loss scenario Areas important for biodiversity conservation expand compared to 2030. The scale of climate change-derived disasters is further amplified compared to the 2030 levels. Strict environmental assessments are conducted for all industrial land developments. Coupled with loss of biodiversity, water stress is further exacerbated. Demand for more expensive eco-friendly products becomes mainstream. The provision of ecosystem services is disrupted, and occurrences of shortages of goods, price increases, regional conflicts, etc. increase from the 2030 levels.

Risks and opportunities in biodiversity conservation and measures to address them are shown in the table on the below.

Failure to develop eco-friendly products generates negative financial impact in the form of lost opportunities for new businesses as well as reduced demand for existing products. Just as products with large carbon footprints are removed from the market to address climate change, products that negatively impact biodiversity conservation will be removed from the market. For example, currently, cotton produced with due consideration for environmental conservation by controlling the use of water and pesticides is third-party certified and distributed as "sustainable cotton." In the future, it is expected that cotton that clearly indicates where and how it was produced and processed, like sustainable cotton, and products made with such cotton will become mainstream in the market. This trend also applies to natural rubber.

The Mitsuboshi Belting Group has already completed the development of product specifications that do not use cotton or natural rubber. In the future, we will clarify, in the Procurement Guidelines, the requirements for cotton and natural rubber suppliers regarding biodiversity conservation, and encourage them to conduct business activities that take biodiversity conservation into consideration.