Ricoh's Commitment for A Green Earth

By MASSITA AHMAD SINGAPORE, June 6 (Bernama) -- Multinational conglomerate, Ricoh Group with its core business in electronics and imaging rolled out the "Eco Action Day" programme on Tuesday throughout its business units across the world. The programme aims to enhance the awareness on the environment in conjunction with the World Environment Day with 2017 denoting Ricoh’s inaugural effort in extending the initiative throughout the region with the theme "Sharing Eco-mind Together". The effort involved nine sales unit of Ricoh in the Asia Pacific region - in Malaysia, Australia, Hong Kong, India, New Zealand, the Philippines, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam. “Starting with this regional initiative, we hope that organisations and individuals will undertake long term commitments for the future benefit and the sustainability of the environment. “Last year, in Singapore alone the number of pledges received from the organisation for the Eco Action Day rose to 207, with 221,247kWh of electricity saved,” said Kazuhisa Goto, the Managing Director for Ricoh Asia Pacific adding that at least 400 companies would be participating in the programme this year. The electricity saved under the programme is sufficient to power up a block of apartments for half a year. Ricoh’s “No Regrets Policy” and its preventive actions underlines that if there is any action that could endanger the public or the environment, efforts will be taken to address the problem even before any scientific findings. “With Ricoh’s 'No Regrets Policy', we believe that we could achieve adequate returns in our conservation efforts by creating new corporate values and consumers. “Our Eco Business Development Centre in Gotemba, Japan helps to develop environmental technology ,” he said. The centre undertakes the feasibility studies on environmental technologies to create new business channels. Ricoh itself is actively playing a role in saving the environment by extending the redemption programme for its toner bottles and toner cartridges including in Malaysia. The company’s used imaging machines and others will be evaluated to identify the parts that could be reused while the toner bottles and cartridges collected will be refilled and sold or sent to plastic recycling centres. In going further with the environmental cause, since 2011 Ricoh Malaysia has established cooperation with Persatuan Pencinta Alam (Malaysian Nature Society) for its community project - the mangrove restoration project at Taman Alam Kuala Selangor. This project helped to educate and create awareness for the locals on the significance of the mangrove habitat and its flora and fauna. The project also involved locals in replanting the mangrove area. -- BERNAMA