Officeworks has released its People & Planet Positive report, covering the first year* of progress against the 2025 community and sustainability commitments.

A continued focus on providing a safe workplace for all team members was reflected in TRIFR* of 6.1 representing a 22.8 per cent improvement on the prior year.

Ensuring the team reflect the communities in which Officeworks operate is a key component of its Diversity and Belonging Plan.

They focused on building meaningful employment opportunities for the Indigenous community, with Indigenous team members now representing 3.8 per cent of the team.

Together with customers and partners, Officeworks supported 7,525 students through partnerships to improve educational outcomes, provided $6.44m in community contributions to local and national causes, planted 794,000 trees and restored 1,500 hectares of land through the Restoring Australia initiative and collected 1,474 tonnes of unwanted products from our customers to be recycled, repaired or repurposed.

From a business perspective, Officeworks had a 7.2 per cent reduction of Scope 1&2 carbon emissions on the prior year, representing a 32 per cent reduction since 2015.

The first phase of the onsite solar energy rollout commenced as part of its commitment to move to 100 per cent renewable energy by 2025.

The business recycled 91 per cent of its operational waste and reduced waste sent to landfill by 32 per cent as part of its commitment to become a zero-waste business.

In addition, the annual equivalent of 6.7m pieces of plastic were removed as they work to ensure all packaging is reusable or recyclable.

Committed to putting people and the planet at the heart of what they do, Officeworks established the 18 ambitious commitments to work towards by 2025, including supporting the aspirations of the team and communities, taking meaningful climate action, contributing towards a more circular economy, and helping customers shop more sustainably.

Officeworks managing director Sarah Hunter said the retailer has increased its focus and investment in the safety and wellbeing of its team  during the global pandemic, resulting in its safest year ever.

“Our success against our People & Planet Positive 2025 commitments is shared and our achievements are only possible thanks to our team, customers and partners.

“As we look ahead, we know some of our goals are ambitious, but we’re committed to making a lasting, positive difference by putting people and the planet at the heart of what we do.”

Focus areas for the next year include continuing to integrate sustainability into business-as-usual practices, making meaningful contributions to the community such as local business support, the installation of solar energy systems at stores and circular economy commitments such as reducing impacts caused by product packaging.

“Our goal is to continue to inspire our team, partners, customers, and communities to take more sustainable actions,’’ said Hunter.

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