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With business sites positioned all over the world, the Nippon Kayaku Group plays an active role as a member of multiple local communities. As a good citizen-company wherever we are, we aim to coexist with surrounding regions by effectively utilizing our resources and valuing communication with local people. We are also deploying our technologies and products on CSR activities such as Next-Generation Development Support and Disaster Recovery Support, thereby contributing to healthy and sustainable local community development.
[Details of specific initiatives]
Under the motto of “Helping Terminally-ill Children and their Families,” 1998 saw Nippon Kayaku mark the 80th anniversary of its foundation with the opening of Asunaro House, an accommodation facility for children undergoing hospital treatment and the family members who accompany them. The facility, which we operate ourselves, lies close to the Saitama Shintoshin area. Asunaro House aims to be a reassuring place to stay for children undergoing either outpatient or inpatient treatment for cancer and other incurable diseases, and their accompanying family members. It welcomed 203 families and a total of 2522 people in 2023 alone.
The facility boasts ten private rooms of just over 18 square meters in size for children accompanied by two adults, a wide dining area and kitchen, a playroom, a laundry, and all the necessary equipment for long-stay guests, who we hope can come to view it as “a home from home.” 2023 also saw us renovate two of the rooms, much to the delight of their occupants.
To further enhance the pleasant guest experience, Nippon Kayaku and related companies periodically send volunteers from among staff and retired staff to clean the premises and cut the grass.
While protecting the privacy of guests, we are working to make Asunaro a place where families can interact, and which helps even a little with alleviating the mental and financial burdens of sick children and their families.
2023 saw Asunaro House celebrate its 25th anniversary. Until that point, it had welcomed some 4,115 family groups and 74,421 individuals.
With Saitama Prefectural Children’s Medical Center, Saitama City Hospital, and the Yamato Acupuncture Clinic among the several neighborhood institutions pouring their utmost into child medical care, we are seeing an increase in families coming from all over Japan to have their children receive yet more specialist and high-level treatment.
The Covid-19 pandemic rather dented visitor numbers, but applications from would-be guests are now gradually rising again. We will therefore continue our infection control measures going forward and welcome yet higher numbers of guests.
Since my appointment as House Manager in 2017, we have tried to make families feel more at home by introducing extra seasonal decorations and other initiatives based on information-sharing with similar facilities across the country.
From now on we will strive each and every day to provide terminally-ill children and their families with a safer, more reassuring and more pleasant experience, and make Asunaro House their “home from home.”
Let us hold in our hearts the “thankyous” we receive when children discharged from hospital return to their real home with their families.
Mr Yamaji, House Manager
Nippon Kayaku provides support to sports and also sets up internal healthy-living initiatives. We will keep promoting these various CSR activities to realize our corporate principle of “Supporting affluent living through safeguarding life and health.”
Volleyball is a sport in which the ball connects people. We therefore approve of and support the activities of Wolfdogs Nagoya which center upon the principle of bringing people together.
We are participating in the Scrum Japan Program, a series of activities initiated by the Japan Rugby Football Union aimed at educating and developing the children and young people who will lead our future through rugby.
We fully subscribe to the aims of the program, and have signed up as a supporting member as part of our CSR activities.
Tokyo Metropolitan Government’s Bureau of Citizens, Culture and Sports recognized Nippon Kayaku as a “Tokyo Sports Promotion Company for 2024.” This award system allows the Tokyo Government to recognize companies that set up outstanding initiatives to promote sport among employees and conduct sports-based CSR activities. Going forward, Nippon Kayaku will continually set up healthy-living initiatives and proactively work on promoting health improvements to employees.
We are currently engaged in next-generation development support initiatives which aim to make the children who will lead our future understand the fun of science.
As our headquarters used to be based in Tokyo’s Kudanshita district, we have been helping Kudan Secondary School out with their General Studies lessons on the topic of “Understanding Local Area.” We have continued this aspect of our local community contributions even since relocating our head office to Marunouchi in 2014. A typical year sees us invite students to our offices to provide them with an introduction to our company, lessons on how to make advertisements, and an explanation of their tasks. We then have them report back at a later date on the results of those tasks.
One task we set the students was: “Think about a Nippon Kayaku-style advertisement which gets lots of people interested.” Our PR Department members taught a lesson on advertising and looked at the effectiveness of advertisements conveying messages of: “Who, What and How.” Discussion groups deepened the debate by generating various ideas, and the students gave us an interim report one month later. Then, one month further on from that, we had the students use PowerPoint to make their final advertisement. We will continue these initiatives in the hope they prove of even just a little help to the students.
August 5th and 6th 2023 saw Nippon Kayaku head to the Science Museum at Takebashi, Tokyo, to exhibit at the Yume Kagaku 21* Committee-sponsored science experiment event for elementary school kids: “Summer Holiday Science Experiments for Kids 2023.” Over 200 children took part in our event.
Under the theme of “Let’s Make a New Galaxy Ball!” did we conduct a handicraft activity using the photosetting resin known as acrylic resin. The completion of our totally one-off key ring was marked by cheers of delight from the children present.
Our science experiment video entitled “The Marvels of Colors: Color experiments to try out at home!” appeared on the Yume Kagaku 21 Committee’s Children’s Science (YouTube) Channel. We both approve of and support the channel’s aims of stimulating scientific curiosity and interest in the children who will lead our future. The video, designed to simplify the appeal of science, was put together by trial and error, based on plans thought up mainly by the younger members of our Research Section.
(Science Experiment Video Outline)
Title: The Marvels of Colors: Color experiments to try out at home!”
Experiment details: Neutralization reaction of bath bombs (bath salts); Felt-tip pen chromatography: the three primary colors
The Joetsu Plant is engaged in several initiatives chiefly aimed at elementary schoolers that use handicraft as a means to familiarize children with science. Two such initiatives involved setting up booths at Joetsu City’s Youth Science Festival and the Myoko City Science Festival (both in Niigata Prefecture).
Our exhibition booth saw us give demonstrations on how to make a kaleidoscope from polarizing film produced at our Joetsu Factory. Child visitors, sometimes with helping hands from their parents, were able to make their own kaleidoscopes decorated to their own tastes. And when looking into the finished versions, the delighted children exclaimed: “How pretty!” “How marvelous!” and “I want to make one at home!” The staff on hand gave dozens of explanations over the course of the day, but any fatigue they had was swept away by the joy of seeing how children reacted. We will continue to offer such practical science events as we further develop our locally-rooted CSR activities.
September 24th 2023 saw Sanyo Onoda City University hold an Open Day event. For the purpose of introducing our local business and getting children more interested in science, we elected to set up a booth.
The experiment we staged was entitled: “Does a red cabbage really cause this? Science’s marvelous Dance of the Seven Outfits!” and consisted of placing the anthocyanin found in red cabbages into various solutions to see how its color changed. We understandably chose this experience for its capacity to make science visually enjoyable for children. With the help of numerous people on the day, we could get through the experiments without a hitch, and achieve a rousing response from the observing children.
August 2nd 2023 saw the Asa Plant welcome seven students from three local schools for a Pre-Job Application Workplace Tour. After providing an outline explanation of the facility, we took them on a tour of the plant. The students took copious notes of our explanations throughout and asked plenty of questions as well. We would be delighted if this tour helped them get a feel for the workplace atmosphere.
Through plant open days, education activities, donations and co-sponsorships, blood donations, cleaning activities and informal get-togethers, the Nippon Kayaku Group is working to give everyone in the immediate local community an insight into what our business is about. The future will see us continue to set up these opportunities to interact and actively communicate with local people as we work on local community regeneration and development.
Wherever we are, we recognize the local community as one of our key stakeholders, not only through CSR, but through employing local people and actively exchanging information with local authorities. This underscores our belief in helping achieve sustainable development through healthy local communities. Both domestically and globally, we are proactive in our local recruitment wherever we set up base, making sure to follow relevant local laws and exceed the local minimum wage.
July 21st 2023 saw us launch over 300 fireworks in deep appreciation of the local community who always look after us well. It was the fourth straight year we had put on this display since 2020 at the Kaji Fishing Port, located a short distance from our Asa Plant. For 2023, we even opened the event with a session of Ryuo taiko drumming, which combined with the fireworks to tremendous effect.
As the event fell on the first day of summer holidays, it was very well attended, with the crowd giving lots of vocal support to the large multicolored firework rings and pulsating taiko performance. The event finished a roaring success as we successfully used the power of fireworks to energize local people and put smiles on faces.
The future will see more such efforts to bring delight to local residents.
October 2023 saw us dig for sweet potatoes just outside our company dorm on a fine autumn day with children from Iwahana Nursery and Konan Kindergarten. A succession of hot summer days ensured our Beni Haruka sweet potato yield was high.
The preschoolers dug into the earth with their own bare hands and, when uncovering potatoes the size of their own faces, smilingly exclaimed: “I got a big one!” The smile-filled activity was also a source of pleasure for our staff members present. Once digging had finished, we enlisted the help of Gunma Sangyo to remove the roots and dirt from the potatoes, load them onto a truck, and deliver them to the nursery and kindergarten.
Every year sees Kayaku Systems Europe (hereafter: KSE) throw its energy into charity activities as it offers support to local non-profit organizations, premises fire brigades, children’s sports teams, the elderly and underprivileged persons. 2023 saw KSE lend support to the construction of a foodbank warehouse facility in the environs of its head office. Foodbanks, for the uninitiated, are institutions which gather large volumes of discarded food approaching its expiry date and redistribute them, along with sanitary items, to people in need (for example, the homeless, single mothers, and refugees, etc.)
The past nine years have also seen KSE engaged in Pink Ribbon Activities, training its focus on breast cancer prevention, gradually raising awareness of the issue and increasing people’s interest in preventative measures. In addition to our long-term links with a non-profit organization that brings together local medical students and Vsetin-area cancer patients, we have also forged links with the Czech Republic’s biggest public health insurance provider.
KSE is also involved in charity activities related to donations of blood and plasma. It was specially commended by the Mayor of Vsetin for its charitable donations and support for non-profit groups in 2023.
Each year sees Kayaku Advanced Materials (hereafter: KAM) join the US Marines’ “Toys for Tots” initiative, which sends new toys and books to underprivileged American children to give them a happier Christmas and a message of hope. Over the years, Toys for Tots has distributed some 652 million toys to some 291 million children, not only bringing hope in Christmas season, but beyond Christmas too.
KAM’s own Toys for Tots efforts have been led for the past six years by employee Russ Burdick, who draws together all the toys we have donated and delivers them to the US Marines. The initiative is of immense personal importance to Russ, who spent many years lobbying for the company’s involvement. Having grasped the initiative’s significance thanks to Russ’s efforts, our employees look forward to their annual participation.
Indicators | Covering | Unit | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
CSR expenditure | non-consolidated | million yen | 254 | 146 | 154 | 149 | 158 |
Total donations | non-consolidated | million yen | 222 | 114 | 123 | 120 | 126 |
Other CSR expenditures | non-consolidated | million yen | 31 | 32 | 31 | 29 | 32 |