Konica Minolta South Africa has become one of the first corporate companies in South Africa to offset its direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions for its 2013 financial year, earning the company a ‘Carbon Neutral’ status for the year.

The company has had a carbon neutral strategy since 2007. Achieving a carbon neutral status is a three step process of calculating a company’s greenhouse gas emissions, reducing these emissions, and then offsetting the remainder.

“Companies usually offset only their direct greenhouse gas emissions, such as fuel usage. These are known as Scope 1 emissions,” said Katie Ross, a carbon advisor of Promethium Carbon, a carbon advisory firm that consulted to Konica Minolta.

Promethium calculated the company’s 2013 greenhouse gas inventory in accordance with the latest greenhouse gas accounting best practice.

“Konica Minolta is also offsetting its Scope 2 emissions, related to electricity consumption, and Scope 3 emissions such as business travel, which includes business flights, staff travel to and from work, and car hire,” she said.

Konica Minolta will offset its total financial year 2013 greenhouse gas inventory of 5 687 tonnes of CO₂e through planting trees in partnership with Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA), an organisation which has developed the largest tree planting programmes in South Africa.

Since 2008, Konica Minolta has partnered with FTFA to plant over 17 000 fruit and indigenous trees at schools and communities across the country. The areas include Johannesburg (Orange Farm, Lawley and Rethabiseng), as well as disadvantaged settlements in Polokwane, Kimberley, East London, Port Elizabeth and Newcastle.

Local communities are first reviewed to see whether they qualify and are then given a tree to plant in their garden.

The indigenous trees and fruit trees planted through Konica Minolta’s 2013 offset project will sequester over 6 500 tons of CO₂e over the programme’s lifespan. The offset project will provide job opportunities as the FTFA tree planting programme includes training in various aspects of support and maintenance,” said Laetitia Coetzer, special projects manager, Konica Minolta South Africa’s marketing co-ordinator.

“FTFA is South Africa’s only social enterprise addressing sustainable development through climate change action, food security and greening, with a strong focus on environmental and global warming education and awareness,” she said.

To ensure the credibility of the carbon neutral claim, Konica Minolta submitted both the carbon footprint and offsetting reports to the Carbon Protocol’s Carbon Neutral Programme. The programme acts as an independent third party verifier. The use of a standardised carbon neutral logo is granted for a year. The logo will be used by Konica Minolta for communications to clients, staff and shareholders.