SUSTAINABILITY BEYOND THE ENVIRONMENT

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Sustainability is a booming conversation topic in 2023. Sometimes, this concept is very closely related to taking care of the environment. However, talking about it should go beyond simply taking care of the environment.  

The UN (United Nations Organization) has set seventeen objectives to achieve by 2030 that promote prosperity and caring for the environment and meet different needs worldwide. These SDGs pursue values that aim to achieve a better future for people, the planet, and nature. What can companies do to help achieve these goals?  

Although the event and experience industries are often removed from these SDGs and their values, here at SOMOS EXPERIENCES we want to be part of the change and contribute to building a better future.    

To this end, the ESG department (Environmental, Social & Governance) was strengthened last year to transmit the importance of these objectives and implement measures so that, together we can help build a better world.  Our Sustainability Policy is clearly aligned with the UN goals and serves as a guide on how to be more sustainable. This policy could be summarized in three fundamental aspects.  

Sustainable Economy  

We form an active part of Spain's economy, and we want to promote sustainable and profitable economic growth in order to offer quality jobs. Likewise, to promote a solid and strong economy, we want to help change the sector by investing in R&D&I and building recognition in the industry. 

While the events industry majorly impacts Spain's economic activity, we want to extend this to the country's global economy. Thanks to the global vision provided by the clients and partners we work with every day, SOMOS is constantly exploring new ways to develop and grow in the industry, and doing so by using new technologies that allow us to create the best experiences that unite people. 

However, we can only innovate if we keep an eye out for new opportunities that allow us to create a sustainable economy over time. By including the Metaverse in our event offerings we show our commitment to this advancement. The Metaverse is a booming trend among clients and diversifies event options and brand interactions with people. Therefore, before offering it to our clients, we created our own office in Decentraland, being the first agency with an office in the Metaverse. 

In search of a better society 

We mentioned earlier the opportunity to offer quality jobs and in order to do so we must take into account people's needs. Therefore, we work to promote equal opportunities and to not discriminate based on race, sex, origin, etc. 
We work hard on parity. We work to give equal opportunities to women and men throughout our different job positions. We must also work to include people with disabilities who are at risk of employment exclusion. 

In this sense, people are companies' most important assets. Here at SOMOS we want to ensure the wellbeing of our teams and keep our strategy centred around them. To do this we recently added People Director, Javier Pacha, and People Manager, Pilar Iglesias to the group. The aim is to improve the employee experience and strengthen the project by focusing on talent and developing the professional careers of those who make up our group.  

We fight for equality by offering people access to different positions regardless of their sex, something which is sometimes stigmatized. For example, we do this by making women heads of events or making sure that reception positions are filled by both women AND men. 

In Defense of the Biosphere 

Finally, caring for the environment, which of course is part of sustainability, is the most talked about part of the Sustainable Development Goals.  
Recently, due to the pandemic and extreme natural disasters, people have become more aware of the need to protect the biosphere. It has become a prominent trend this year for both brands and people. 

However, being sustainable is not about being trendy, it is about being committed to our planet and the impact we create with every action we take.  It means being continuously committed to carrying out good practices and transmitting them to everyone around us. 

In the SOMOS Experiences ESG department's policy, we have implemented a series of good practices that can be done when producing every event and daily in order to reduce the impact we generate.  

Specifically, our planning and development must comply with environmental regulations. We can reuse event furniture, minimise waste, eliminate single-use containers as much as possible, and pursue carbon neutrality in our products by reducing and offsetting our carbon footprint.  

To do this, we integrated a sustainable project management system into our value chain, working alongside suppliers who share our policy, and will work to carry out the necessary specifications. In this system we take into account product origins, the impact they generate, and the possibility of using recyclable materials, in each phase of the event.

We also try to instill these good practices in our clients, since we have a sustainable event management system thanks to Evensost's “Certificate of Compliance” and the international standard UNE-EN-ISO 20121:2013. We also work with clients certified by AENOR, adapting the event production to the certification measurements. In addition, we encourage measuring and compensating for our clients' carbon footprint in the hope of reversing the impact we generate. 

As a result of our commitment, more and more certified sustainable events are taking place every day. Our hard work paid off when we were recognised as one of the most sustainable companies in the Barcelona Biosphere. We received the Tourism Sustainability Commitment certificate, in the MICE category, for the second consecutive year. 

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