Environmental Performance
In light of the worsening climate crisis, decreasing our own environmental impact is at the top of SAP’s sustainability agenda.
As a result of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the introduction of a more flexible working model at SAP, our net carbon emissions dropped to 110 kilotons (kt), representing a year over year decrease of 18.5% (2020: 135 kt).
Since 2017, we have complied with the requirements of the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) and are committed to reducing emissions by 85% by 2050 compared to the base-year level 2016, including our entire Scope 3 value chain emissions such as our products-in-use emissions at our customers.
In January 2022, we committed to achieve net zero across our entire value chain by 2030 in alignment with the SBTi Net-Zero Standard - 20 years earlier than originally planned.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and SAP’s pledge to flexible, trust-based working styles, electricity consumption in our offices continued to be low as the majority of employees remained in a remote working model.
Facilities management staff design and operate our facilities based on robust environmental standards. In addition, our IT operations personnel is committed to optimizing energy consumption in our data centers.
We have introduced initiatives to drive efficiency and innovation with respect to our buildings, data center operations, and infrastructure.
Our e-waste comes from data center servers and from IT equipment including PCs, peripherals, and mobile devices. In multiple SAP locations, we cooperate with international and local e-waste disposal partners to refurbish and recycle our e-waste.
The 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) provide a globally accepted framework which we use for communicating our purpose to “help the world run better and improve people’s lives.”The following table describes the potential positive and negative direct or indirect impacts of our company and of our products and services related to SDGs that have received a high ranking in our materiality analysis. This includes both social and environmental impacts.
SDG 3 Good Health and Well-Being |
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| Our Potential Direct and Indirect Impact | Direct: (+) Provide access to a healthy lifestyle and a safe and healthy working environment for our employees |
Indirect: (+) Enhance safe and healthy working conditions, healthcare, and personalized medicine on a global scale (–) Increase transparency of physical, medical, and health conditions of individuals, which might be abused |
| Our KPIs and Targets | Business Health Culture Index | |
| Our Policies and Selected Activities and Programs to Enhance Positive Impacts and Mitigate Negative Impacts | Direct: Global Health and Safety Management Policy; Employee Assistance Program; Corporate Oncology Program for Employees; Mental Health Initiative |
Indirect: SAP solutions for healthcare; SAP Environment, Health, and Safety Management; SAP SuccessFactors Well-Being Management by Virgin Pulse; Corona-Warn-App |
| Where You Can Find More Information in the SAP Integrated Report and Other Sources | Employees and Social Investments SAP and SDG 3, Healthcare, SAP Environment, Health, and Safety Management, SAP Mental Health Initiative, SAP’s COVID-19 Response, Corona-Warn-App, SAP Vaccine Collaboration Hub |
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SDG 4 Quality Education |
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| Our Potential Direct and Indirect Impact | Direct: (+) Train and educate SAP employees |
Indirect: (+) Build capability in our ecosystem and among our customers |
| Our KPIs and Targets | Engaging two million children, youth, and young adults in digital skills and coding programs by 2022 | |
| Our Policies and Selected Activities and Programs to Enhance Positive Impacts and Mitigate Negative Impacts | Direct: Cloud-based learning management system for employees |
Indirect: openSAP; CSR digital literacy programs; SAP digital learning initiative |
| Where You Can Find More Information in the SAP Integrated Report and Other Sources | Employees and Social Investments SAP and SDG 4, SAP Learning for Life, Powering Opportunity Through Digital Inclusion, SAP Digital Learning Initiative |
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SDG 8 Decent Work and Economic Growth |
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| Our Potential Direct and Indirect Impact | Direct: (+) Create decent jobs at SAP through our growth plans, specifically in developing markets |
Indirect: (+) Create three million jobs in our ecosystem (based on a 2017 study by SAP and PwC) (+) Enable an inclusive economy (+) Respect human rights across value chains (+) Combat forced and child labor throughout supply chains (–) Fuel negative effects on employment through digitalization and automation; potentially increase precarious jobs |
| Our KPIs and Targets | Number of employees | |
| Our Policies and Selected Activities and Programs to Enhance Positive Impacts and Mitigate Negative Impacts | Direct: SAP recruiting programs |
Indirect: SAP Rural Sourcing Management; SAP Ariba Supplier Risk; Partnership with Social Enterprise UK |
| Where You Can Find More Information in the SAP Integrated Report and Other Sources | Employees and Social Investments SAP and SDG 8, Skilled and Inclusive Workforce, Pledge to Flex, Supporting Social Entrepreneurship, Powering Opportunity Through Digital Inclusion, SAP Solutions for Social Responsibility, SAP Rural Sourcing Management |
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SDG 9 Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure |
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| Our Potential Direct and Indirect Impact | Direct: (+) Increase inclusive and sustainable industrialization through SAP’s investments in research and development (including in developing countries) |
Indirect: (+) Support providers of infrastructure, financial services and clean technologies (+) Provide “Best Practice” business processes through standard software solutions (+) Integrate small and medium-sized enterprises into global value chains and markets |
| Our KPIs and Targets | NA | |
| Our Policies and Selected Activities and Programs to Enhance Positive Impacts and Mitigate Negative Impacts | Direct: SAP Labs Network; One Billion Lives initiative fostering purpose-driven innovation |
Indirect: SAP support for startups through various programs |
| Where You Can Find More Information in the SAP Integrated Report and Other Sources | Products, Research & Development, and Services, Employees and Social Investments, SAP and SDG 9, SAP Innovation, One Billion Lives Initiative, SAP.io | |
SDG 10 Reduced Inequalities |
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| Our Potential Direct and Indirect Impact | Direct (+) Ensure equal opportunity and inclusion of all employees, irrespective of age, sex, disability, race, ethnicity, origin, religion, or economic or other status |
Indirect (+) Enable an inclusive economy by providing tools and systems to foster inclusion of all in workforce and supply chains (–) Decouple societal groups from entire areas of employment through an accelerated digital divide and lack of digital skills |
| Our KPIs and Targets | – 30% women in management by year end 2022
– Double the representation of African-American talent in the U.S. over the next three years
– Reach 5% of annual addressable procurement spend with social enterprises and with diverse businesses by 2025
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| Our Policies and Selected Activities and Programs to Enhance Positive Impacts and Mitigate Negative Impacts | Direct: Human Rights Commitment Statement; Diversity & Inclusion programs including EDGE certification; SAP Global Anti-Discrimination Policy; 5 & 5 by ’25 initiative |
Indirect: SAP solutions for social responsibility; SAP Ariba Supplier Risk Management |
| Where You Can Find More Information in the SAP Integrated Report and Other Sources | SAP and SDG 10, Human Rights Commitment Statement, Equality for All, Diversity and Inclusion, Social Justice, Spotlight Black Businesses, Equal Pay for Equal Work, Fostering Corporate Spend with Diverse Suppliers, Powering Opportunity Through Digital Inclusion, SAP Product Accessibility, SAP Solutions for Social Responsibility, SAP Rural Sourcing Management | |
SDG 12 Responsible Consumption and Production |
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| Our Potential Direct and Indirect Impact | Direct: (+) Drive sustainable business practices and integrated reporting (–) Use energy, water, and resources; produce waste |
Indirect: (+) Decouple economic prosperity from resource consumption by enabling transparency and optimizing resource productivity in linear or circular economies (–) Increase absolute resource and energy consumption because efficiency gains through automation may be counteracted (rebound effect) |
| Our KPIs and Targets | We drive resource productivity with an aspiration to a world with zero waste. | |
| Our Policies and Selected Activities and Programs to Enhance Positive Impacts and Mitigate Negative Impacts | Direct: Beyond Single-Use Plastics initiative; Supplier Code of Conduct; Sustainable Procurement; e-waste recycling |
Indirect: SAP Responsible Design and Production; 5 & 5 by ’25 initiative; SAP Ariba Supplier Risk Management; SAP Digital Supply Chain; SAP Rural Sourcing Management; SAP Logistics Business Network and Material Traceability |
| Where You Can Find More Information in the SAP Integrated Report and Other Sources | Energy and Emissions, Waste and Water, Sustainable Procurement Environmental Policy, SAP and SDG 12, Circular Economy, SAP Solutions for Circular Economy, Circular Design Project, SAP and Topolytics Launch COP26 Waste Insights Project, Phase out single-use plastics, Buy social: 5 & 5 by ’25, SHIFT: Digital tools to fight ocean plastics, Material traceability, GreenToken by SAP |
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SDG 13 Climate Action |
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| Our Potential Direct and Indirect Impact | Direct: (+) Assume responsibility for products in use-related emissions by running customer applications in the SAP green cloud (–) Emit greenhouse gases |
Indirect: (+) Contribute to climate change mitigation and strengthen resilience and adaptive capacity to climate-related hazards and natural disasters of our customers (+) Enable holistic operational steering by integrating climate-change relevant parameters and help understand and minimize the climate footprint of a company’s products, operations, and services (–) Increase customers’ energy consumption through use of software |
| Our KPIs and Targets | Become carbon neutral by 2023 | |
| Our Policies and Selected Activities and Programs to Enhance Positive Impacts and Mitigate Negative Impacts | Direct: Global Environmental Policy; Report and reduce CO2 emissions and energy consumption; Procure 100% renewable electricity; Carbon impact relevance for Executive Board compensation |
Indirect: Green Cloud; Business ambition for 1.5°C; Climate 21 program; SAP Product Carbon Footprint Management; SAP Landscape Management Cloud; SAP Transportation Management; Concur Travel, and TripIT |
| Where You Can Find More Information in the SAP Integrated Report and Other Sources | Energy and Emissions, Compensation Report, Environmental Policy, SAP and SDG 13, Climate Action, Climate Change: What SAP Is Doing, SAP sets 1.5°C science-based emissions reduction targets aligned with a net-zero future, SAP’s investment in Livelihoods Carbon Funds, SAP joins 1t.org with a pledge to plant 21 million trees, Climate 21, SAP Product Carbon Footprint Management, SAP Concur Sustainable Travel | |
SDG 17 Partnerships for the Goals |
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| Our Potential Direct and Indirect Impact | Direct: (+) Build capacity throughout our broader ecosystem |
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| Our KPIs and Targets | NA | |
| Our Policies and Selected Activities and Programs to Enhance Positive Impacts and Mitigate Negative Impacts | For more information, see the section Memberships, Partnerships, and Commitments | |
| Where You Can Find More Information in the SAP Integrated Report and Other Sources | Employees and Social Investment, Memberships, Partnerships, and Commitments, SAP and SDG 17, SAP and UNICEF, SAP Founding Member of Value Balancing Alliance, SDG Ambition, SAP joins the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, WEF Global Plastic Action Partnership, SAP Is Innovation Partner in WBSCD’s Value Chain Carbon Transparency Pathfinder, SAP joins the Global Alliance for YOUth | |