Environmental Standards
1Working with the awareness that climate change and unsustainable depletion of natural resources threaten the world, Doğuş Group continuously reviews and replaces its ways of doing business in order to minimise adverse environmental impact. Regarding energy efficiency and water and waste management among its priority environmental areas, the Group undertakes various studies in these areas. Also, as a responsible organisation, Doğuş Group strives to increase environmental and social awareness among its stakeholders as well.
Within the framework of the Group's approach in this area, Group companies have also been taking pioneering initiatives in their sectors in the area of sustainability. The main sponsor of World Widelife Fund Turkey since 1992, Garanti Bank aims to shape all its business practices within the scope of environmental awareness through the Environment Committee it put in place in 2010. Also, having signed the UN Global Compact in 2010, Doğuş Group issued its fist Social Responsibility Report this year, a first of a kind initiative in the Turkish automotive industry. Meanwhile, Doğuş Media Group, the first company to ever release a carbon footprint report in Turkey, has been broadcasting the environmentalist NTV Green Screen program since 2008.
As much as the Group companies themselves, the Ayhan Şahenk Foundation, founded by the Eternal Leader of Doğuş Group Ayhan Şahenk in 1992 makes a significant contribution to the Group's endeavours for sustainability both through its own work and also by the cooperation it forms with the Group companies. The Foundation has been undertaking the in-group paper recycling project since 2002. During 2010, 376,845 kg of paper has been collected by the Group. Hence the amount of paper sent to recycling between 2002-2010 has reached 5,500 tons. In yet another project, the Ayhan Şahenk Forests of Love, carried out by the Foundation, 540,000 trees have been planted to date.