Companies participating in the Eco-First Program must commit themselves on environmental protection initiatives. Then, they are permitted to use the Eco-First Mark in publications and advertising.

Presenting its Eco-First commitment, Shiseido President Shinzo Maeda, detailed the company’s environmental protection targets featuring initiatives to prevent global warming, to promote waste recycling, to reduce the use of containers and packaging, etc.

Shinzo Maeda said the company will work to reduce CO2 emissions from business activities in an effort to realize a low-carbon society with the aim to reduce CO2 emissions by 15% by fiscal 2010 (per unit production compared with fiscal 1990) in Japanese factories and by 10% in overseas factories.

Shiseido will also reduce CO2 emissions derived from products by actively utilizing carbon-neutral plant-based materials as raw materials for products.

Concerning polyethylene plastic, which is the primary material used in containers, Shiseido says it will work with material manufacturers to move to plant-based plastics “in an effort to conserve the planet’s limited petroleum resources”. This process will be implemented in fiscal year 2011, in parallel “with the start of mass production of plant-based plastics”.

Shiseido aims at substituting at least 50% of the volume of plastic currently being used (approximately 2,000 tons in the domestic cosmetics business) by fiscal year 2020.