Did you know that we are continuously improving our sustainable practices through various collaborations? Currently, corporate environmental management student Takuto is conducting carbon and biodiversity footprint calculations for Semma as part of his master’s thesis. What is the project about, and what are Takuto’s thoughts on sustainability? Read more here!
Did you know that we continuously engage on various projects to improve our operations and their sustainability? We participate in different projects and studies, such as Planetary Well-being for JYU and JYU.Wisdom. For instance, in 2021 we worked with a University of Jyväskylä student on a master’s thesis titled The Climate Impact of Student and Workplace Restaurants and Measures to Reduce Them. This year, we’re continuing the collaboration with a new thesis that also focuses on sustainability.
We decided to sit down and discuss the thesis and sustainability in general with Takuto Ikeoka, an corporate environmental management student at the University of Jyväskylä, who will do his master’s thesis in collaboration with us. Takuto is familiar with our restaurants from a student dining perspective. However, when his thesis supervisor suggested that we could be a potential partner for his project, his interest in our company was sparked in a new way. According to Takuto, it’s inspiring to contribute to the sustainability development of a well-known company operating on a campus area during his academic journey.
Takuto has extensive experience in tasks related to environmental well-being and responsibility. In addition to his studies, he has completed an internship in sustainable development and written several articles on the topic. Furthermore, he is well-versed in global environmental policy. Takuto believes that environmental impacts and the ecological footprint of companies are hot topics in Finland as well. However, areas such as biodiversity management require further research. On the positive side, many companies are genuinely interested in making sustainable choices. Takuto emphasizes that progress comes through developing new practices – something that is thankfully happening continuously.
In his thesis, Takuto is conducting carbon and biodiversity footprint calculations of our operations, with a specific focus on our food sourcing, investigating their impact on the environment. We’ve been providing him with data collected over several years, such as information related to our food purchases (meaning the raw materials used on our food). Based on this material, Takuto will create a summary of how our operations affect nature. The results will enable us to further develop our sustainability practices. The calculation process is still ongoing, and the detailed results will be finalized as the thesis progresses. However, Takuto has already noticed some intriguing insights, such as the difference in consumed food among different regions, for example, in comparison with that of his home country, Japan.. He demonstrated that our purchased food includes more alternative meat and dairy products and wheat and rye products, which seem to be more common in Finland. We’ll discuss the results once the thesis is complete, and we’re eagerly anticipating the progress of the calculation.
At the end of our discussion, Takuto pointed out that conducting an ecological footprint analysis is essentially the starting point for developing more environmentally friendly practices. To improve, you need to have an understanding of the current situation, whether you’re a company or an individual. He hopes that people, both in businesses and in their personal lives, will become increasingly interested in understanding the impact of their actions on the environment. We certainly are, so head over to our website to read the updated Sustainability section for more information on the topic!