As a company in the business of handling chemical substances, the Kureha Group makes voluntary efforts to preserve the environment and protect personal safety and health in all business processes, from product development to product manufacturing, distribution, usage, final consumption, disposal, and recycling. The Kureha Group refers to these efforts as Responsible Care (RC) activities.
Responsible Care (RC) activities are based on seven items: environmental protection, safety and disaster prevention, occupational safety and health, product safety & quality assurance, logistics safety, energy management, and community relations.

Responsible Care (RC) is a global initiative practiced by chemical companies in 63 countries and territories. The Global Charter was established as a guiding principle of activities to spread and promote RC activities around the globe, which all chemical companies operating globally are encouraged to sign and implement.
The RC Global Charter, enacted by ICCA, was first published in 2006. By 2014, key activities were changed in the revision of the Charter. Kureha signed the revised Charter in September of the same year, in the name of the President and Representative Director, announcing our international cooperation with RC activities.

Kureha has belonged to the Japan Responsible Care Council (currently Japan Chemical Industry Association RC Committee) since its inception. We declared the implementation of RC in April 1995, and, having established our RC policy, have been promoting RC activities.

Kureha's RC activities include the following seven items: environmental protection, safety and disaster prevention, occupational safety and health, product safety & quality assurance, logistics safety, energy management, and community relations. These seven items are integrated into one RC management system, with each item promoted primarily by a department covering that area under the Responsible Care Subcommittee, a subcommittee of the Sustainability Coordination Committee. These departments formulate a plan for every fiscal year, promote activities, then receive reviews of activity results from management, and reflect these results in the next fiscal year's activity plan.
We aim to continually improve results through such a PDCA (Plan, Do, Check, Act) Cycle. We have also acquired external certification for our Environmental Management System (ISO 14001), Quality Management System (ISO 9001), and Occupational Safety and Health Management System (ISO 45001)*, and we are working to utilize this in maintaining and improving each Management System.

■ The Kureha Group RC Council
Under the Responsible Care Subcommittee, we established the Kureha Group RC Council, consisting of Kureha and Group companies in Japan that have declared the implementation of RC. The Council also has working groups to promote each activity. The RC Council promotes activities as a Group by sharing the plans, goals, and issues of RC activities to the entire Group, and by understanding and discussing the activities of each company and working group.

The results of the reviews of our RC Management System and the external examinations of each ISO Management System are reported to the Sustainability Coordination Committee, which then deliberates on how to address important issues of concern.
In fiscal 2020, we decided it was necessary to strengthen company-wide measures for environmental management, for which regulations are becoming stricter globally. We discussed clarifying systems and responsibilities for a more effective management system, and improvements are underway. Since then, in line with the reinforcement measures formulated, we have been promoting improvements by strengthening RC audits as well as regularly providing management and employees with education on environmental laws and regulations to ensure that they are fully aware of legal requirements.