Damen Schelde Marine Services (DSMS)
Our strategy and ambitions towards the Damen Sustainability Roadmap
1. Sustainable Operations
a. Safe working conditions are of high importance for DSMS. The past year we had zero incidents. We monitor the number of incidents in our warehouse and we encourage our workers to report any accidents or incidents. Moreover, we have a safety meeting 4 times per year. Additionally, we have several trainings throughout the year such as first aid training and forklift & heavy equipment trainings.
b. Our ambition is to become more sustainable, and the most sustainable supplier of high quality marine diesel engine parts. To achieve our ambition we are working towards making our activities more sustainable. Some examples:
• When forwarding the orders to the clients we choose the most optimal routes, hence achieving lower emissions. We have warehouses in strategic locations and we strive to offer the parts to our customers from the best possible location.
• We optimize the container freight, every shipment is full.
• The majority of our import operations is done through ship freight and not air freight – unless it is necessary.
• Our warehouse employees are trying to use less materials in packing -while keeping up to our high standards- and are reusing materials when possible. We are also looking towards more sustainable materials – such as using recycled plastic.
• We separate our waste. There is a company responsible for taking the plastic. Moreover, we separate the metals and sell them to another company to be recycled. Also chemicals and other products used for working are monitored and handled/disposed in a responsible manner.
• We do audits to our suppliers, ensuring the quality of our supply chain. The audits also include assessment of staff policies (for example how is the working environment, are workers wearing protective equipment), sustainability of production and protection of the environment.
c. At DSMS we also aim to have a positive impact for society. This year we aim to have a volunteering day for our employees.
d. Working with COVID-19: DSMS adapted to the changing working conditions resulted by the COVID-19 pandemic. Working from home policies were introduced and further attention is given to the health of our employees.
2. Sustainable Organization
a. Internal commitment: DSMS has an internal commitment to become more sustainable and puts this commitment to practice. In 2022, DSMS has a designated employee working towards making the company more sustainable. This also includes working towards getting the ISO 14001 and starting to monitor reliably and transparently our environmental and social performance. With monitoring and taking the first steps towards establishing the baseline of our emissions we also want to introduce reduction goals afterwards (and therefore lowering our carbon footprint). Additionally, the sustainability employee is responsible to raise internal awareness on issues related to sustainability. For example, it is agreed to give a sustainability training to the DSMS employees.
b. DSMS promotes a healthy lifestyle and supports the employees to achieve that.
• Every week we have fresh fruits delivered to our office.
• Gym subscription for our employees can be subsidized by DSMS.
c. In 2021 we organized an event together with the young Damen organization. The event’s topic evolved around what steps can DSMS take to become more sustainable and to contribute to a cleaner world. Around 25 young Damen professionals had come from all over the country to Vlissingen to have a brainstorm session regarding the sustainability journey of DSMS. You can read more about it here: https://damenscheldeparts.com/news-and-events/a-sustainable-future-for-damen-schelde-marine-services
3. Design for Sustainability
a. Design for lower emissions: We comply with the Marpol VI regulations and herewith we ensure that the equipment requested has the correct IMO/NOx marking. Moreover, we supply cermet coated parts – such as piston rings – for supporting operations on low-sulphur fuels. DSMS is also looking to widening the scope to latest technological developments and support accordingly our clients to comply with the latest environmental regulations.
b. Digitalization: We believe that digitalization results to more efficient business and has many positive results as it reduces paper waste, improves transparency and improves time management. Sustainability and digitalization go hand in hand. DSMS is continuously working on having a high quality webshop in our website for our clients where they can complete their orders. Digital technology helps us to be accessible to our clients 24/7. Therefore it allows us to become waste free and make smarter decisions based on data. With the use of analytics resulting from the use of digital technology we want to deploy solutions that will allow us to lower our overall emissions.
