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It is the policy of Kodak
Australasia to carry out its business activities in
a manner consistent with sound health, safety and
environmental management practices and to comply with
applicable health, safety and environmental laws and
regulations. The company will produce and sell products
which, when manufactured, handled, transported, used
and disposed of in accordance with appropriate labelling
and product literature, are safe for employees, customers
and others.
Company managers and supervisors
are responsible for establishing and continually improving
management systems to implement this policy, including
creation and maintenance of a clean, healthful and
safe workplace for our employees, prevention of pollution,
and for compliance with applicable laws and regulations,
company Kodak's Performance standards and other external
requirements to which the company subscribes.
Health, safety and environmental
responsibility is fundamental to Kodak Values. As
a world-class company and the world leader in imaging,
our vision is to make measurable improvements in the
health, safety and environmental aspects of our products,
services and operations... every day... every month...
every year. To realise this vision, all Kodak operations
and employees around the world will work together
in protecting the quality of the environment and the
health and safety of our employees, customers and
neighbours.
Research Support
• To extend knowledge
by conducting or supporting research on the health,
safety and environmental effects of our products,
processes and waste materials.
Plant Operation
• To operate our plants and facilities in a manner
that protects the environment and the health and safety
of our employees and the public, conserves natural
resources and energy and demonstrates our commitment
to continual improvement and the prevention of pollution.
Management Planning
• To include health,
safety and environmental considerations in our planning
for existing and new products and processes.
Product Development
• To develop and market products that can be
manufactured, transported, used, serviced and disposed
of safely and responsibly. Through the use of design
and best management practices, improvements are continually
made in the conservation of natural resources.
Customer Support
• To assist customers
on the safe and responsible use, transportation, storage
and disposal of our products.
Public Policy
• To participate with
government and others in creating responsible laws,
regulations, and standards to safeguard the community,
workplace and environment.
Performance Measurement
• To measure our health,
safety and environmental performance on a regular
basis and provide timely, appropriate information
to officials, employees, customers, shareowners and
the public.
Community Concerns
• To recognise and
respond to community concerns about our operations
and to work with the community and others to understand
and resolve health, safety and environment issues
about our operations.
External Involvement
• To encourage employees
when outside of work to apply the same principles
for health, safety and environment that are applied
at work. 
Responsible Care is an
initiative of the chemical industry to improve the
health, safety and environmental performance of its
operations and to increase community involvement and
awareness of the industry. Adherence to Responsible
Care is a condition of membership of the Australian
chemical industry's peak body, the Plastics and Chemicals
Industries Association (PACIA). PACIA has developed
eight Responsible Care Codes of Practice covering
the management of hazards associated with chemical
operations and products. The Codes incorporate but
go well beyond existing legal requirements.
In total, the eight Codes
contain 295 management practices specifying what issues
a company must address to improve its Health Safety
and Environment (HSE) performance around chemicals.
All companies who are part
of the Responsible Care initiative are ranked according
to their overall compliance with the Codes of Practice.
In 2001, Kodak Australia
was ranked No.1 out of 70 participating companies.
To learn more about The
Responsible Care Program visit the PACIA web site:
http://www.pacia.org.au/
Occupational health and
safety is a priority issue at Kodak Australia. Company
policy and strategy for reducing occupational risks
includes: identifying risk associated with activities
in the workplace; assessing the seriousness of risks;
and controlling (ie. eliminating) high risk factors
from work tasks.
The Kodak Australia Health
, Safety & Environmental management system has
been assessed by Workcover/worksafe auditors in Victoria
and meets the requirements of SafetyMAP.
The company aims for significant
reductions in workplace injuries in the long term
by developing short-term performance goals which focus
on measures to identify, assess and control hazards.
Within the Kodak Worldwide
HSE performance management system, Australia has had
the following safety achievements recognised:
1998-2000 : 10 X (>80%)
improvement in Lost time injury (LTI) rate
1998-2000 : 40% improvement in restricted work case
rate
1998-2000 : 25% improvement in total accident case
rate
1999 & 2000 : twice have run 1 million hours without
a LTI.
Kodak has an established
medical centre with full-time staff including a physician,
nursing staff, physiotherapist, safety and ergonomics
specialists.
As part of Kodak's ongoing
commitment to protect the health and safety of its
employees as well as protecting the environment, every
Australian employee has recently received a 'Stop
- Think - Plan' prompt card. The card serves
to remind employees about how they can go about day-to-day
activities safely.
In essence the message
is:
STOP - "What am I about to do?"
THINK - "What might go wrong?"
PLAN - "Decide how to do the work safely."
By following the 3 simple steps, employees can be
more alert to the possibility of being injured and
take steps to prevent accidents at work and at home.
MSDS's are available as
guidelines for hazardous substances, detailing what
the hazards are, how to use them safely (ie what controls
are needed). Material Safety Data Sheets may also
be available for other products in order to provide
guidance on their safe use and disposal; their existence
does not imply that the product is subject to regulation
as a chemical substance or mixture.
If you would like to know more about a particular
chemical or substance click on the link below to search
Kodak's MSDS database.
http://www.kodak.com/go/msds
The National Packaging Covenant
(NPC) is an industry based voluntary initiative to
make kerbside collection, of consumer packaging waste,
an economically viable & sustainable recycling
system. An important aspect to this is the minimisation
of packaging waste and the principle of product stewardship.
Kodak is a signatory to the National Packaging Covenant
and has had it's Action Plan accepted by The National
Packaging Covenant Council, the body overseeing the
NPC.
Packaging presents major problems
to the community and to the environment. Packaging
can waste valuable resources in an unsustainable way,
take up increasingly scarce landfill space, and contribute
to litter and the pollution of our oceans and waterways.
The National Packaging Covenant (NPC) aims to reduce
the environmental impacts of packaging.
The aims of the National
Packaging Covenant are twofold:
The first goal is to provide a one off capital injection
of funds into the recycling industry. The second goal
is to support the recycling industry by getting the
packaging supply chain to participate in making packaging
products more easily recyclable and to use more recycled
materials.
Kodak has been aware of
the issues of packaging for a number of years and
has been actively working to make continuous improvements
in it's environmental performance.
You can download a copy
of our action plan here:
Kodak
National Packaging Covenant Action Plan.pdf
(562kb)
Updated November 2002
Kodak has submitted it's
first year progress report to the National Packaging
Covenant Council. You can get more details about specific
projects we have been undertaking at Kodak by reading
the following one page case studies:
Lightweighting
- 48kb
Carton
Reuse - 127kb
Recycling
- 114kb
Film
container recycling - 87kb
Bulk
rolls - 31kb
ISO 14001
Kodak's Coburg manufacturing
site and support services have achieved certification
to the International Environmental Management System
Standard ISO14001.
Formal routine external
audits over the last three years have confirmed that
Kodak's manufacturing facility at Coburg continues
to operate in compliance with the international standard
ISO 14001. BVQI is the certifying company.
Stormwater Protection
Kodak has long been aware
of the location of the manufacturing facility at Coburg,
and its environmental responsibility to protect the
surrounding stormwater drains from chemical contamination.
An extensive review of the risks associated with the
movement of chemicals around the site resulted in
the installation of additional warning signage around
roadways and loading bays where chemicals (and wastes)
are handled.
The company has also installed
additional litter traps at key locations within the
plant as well as a major installation at the main
site stormwater outlet. These new measures supplement
existing stormwater protection systems such as bunding
around tanks, chemical spill cleanup kits, stormwater
drain isolation valves and prominent labelling of
stormwater entry points across the Coburg site.
Recycling
An extensive range of non-hazardous
waste materials generated at the Coburg site are collected
for recycling or reuse. These include paper, cardboard,
glass/plastic and metal beverage containers, damaged
wooden pallets, and more recently various types of
plastic packaging materials such as shrinkwrap, polyethylene
film and bags and cleaned polyethylene bottles. Green
waste from the site gardening activities is also collected
for recycling into compost. Empty steel and plastic
drums that have contained chemical raw materials are
recycled for reconditioning and reuse via an EPA-licensed
contractor.
Any solid waste materials deemed
hazardous (ie."prescribed") by the EPA are
dealt with only via the appropriate EPA-licensed waste
management companies.
Materials containing silver,
such as waste photographic film and paper and filter
cake from wastewater treatment are collected and sent
to Eastman Kodak in the USA for recovery of the silver.
Spent fluorescent tubes are also
recycled via a local facility who recover the Mercury,
glass and metal components.
New Legionella Controls
For Cooling Towers
The Victorian Government
has established a new regulatory framework for property
and business owners that use cooling tower systems.
From March 2001, obligations
under the Building (Legionella) Act 2000 Victoria
and new building, health and plumbing regulations
commenced. These establish the framework to ensure
that potential risks associated with cooling tower
systems to the public and workplace safety issues
are addressed.
The key elements of the
new regulations include:
• All cooling towers must be registered with
the Building Control Commission.
• Risk Assessments must be performed and Risk
Management Plans must be developed for all cooling
tower systems.
• Independent audit of risk management plans
to be conducted annually.
• Department of Human Services will carry out
random inspections of cooling towers.
• Cooling tower systems must be Maintained in
accordance with the risk assessment and provisions
of the Health regulations.
The various cooling towers
located on the Kodak manufacturing site at Coburg
are operated in strict accordance with the new regulations.
Kodak has played a key
role in establishing the P.U.R.E. (Photographic Uniform
Regulations for the Environment) Code of Practice,
developed by the photographic industry and sewerage
authorities around Australia to help photo laboratories
operate in the most environmentally acceptable way
and simplify the process for obtaining a Trade Waste
Agreement.
To learn more about P.U.R.E.
visit their website at: http://www.photoimaging.com.au/PURE2002/index.html
 Recycling
of Single Use Cameras
Kodak is committed to deliver
products and services that meet customers' environmental
needs. Several internal management processes drive
toward that commitment. Externally, Kodak encourages
customers and suppliers to practice product stewardship.
An example of Environmental Stewardship: the Single-Use
Camera - over 200,000,000 recycled so far - over 3,000,000
from Australia alone.
The Kodak One Time Use Camera
program (OTUC) has become a centrepiece in Kodak's
widespread efforts in recycling, re-use, and product
stewardship. What began as an environmental "ugly
duckling," has turned into an environmental swan
through innovation, commitment, and hard work.
Kodak's single-use cameras were
introduced in 1987 to meet the needs of a specific
customer base - those who wanted an inexpensive camera
for certain occasions to take pictures that might
otherwise be missed. The quality of the 35mm pictures
was outstanding, and the cameras were an immediate
success.
The first Kodak single-use cameras
were called "Kodak Fling" cameras, a name
that inadvertently highlighted the disposable aspect
of the product. Consumers began to refer to them as
"disposables" or "throwaways."
Today, many still do - yet nothing could be further
from the truth.
In those first few years, sales
soared and Popular Science Magazine selected our panoramic
single-use camera for a "Best of What's New"
award for science and technology. Environmental groups,
however, were calling the Kodak Fling camera "ecologically
offensive."
That's when the real work began.
In 1990-1991, a massive effort began to redesign single-use
cameras to facilitate recycling and reuse of parts.
This effort involved the integration of business,
development, design and environmental personnel. The
new designs that emerged featured parts that were
easier to inspect and to reuse, and an easier means
for reloading film.
To get their prints, consumers
must take the single-use cameras to a photofinisher.
This necessary step provides a natural collection
points for the cameras, and became a focal point for
our efforts to get the camera bodies returned to Kodak.
By leveraging our excellent customer relationships
with photofinishers around the world, we established
a variety of marketing and promotional programs to
get the camera shells back to the company once the
customer's film had been removed.
The result is a world-class recycling
rate of over 60 percent in Australia and approximately
60 percent worldwide, comparing favourably with the
recycling rate other products such as aluminium cans
or office paper.
Since we began the program
in 1990, we have recycled more than 200 million cameras.
Our numbers and percentages are going up every year,
a mark of continual improvement.
Kodak's engineers and manufacturing
people found ways to make excellent use of the returned
cameras. They did so by considering all opportunities
for recycling and re-use across the entire product
cycle, from product design to end-of-life. The result
is a good example of integrating health, safety and
environmental aspects into the business process.
Today, "recyclability"
is an essential factor in developing new single-use
cameras. No new Kodak OTUC product is approved for
commercialisation until it complies with this criterion.
The company's product and design engineers are frequently
sent to visit photofinishers to observe the handling
of single-use cameras. This first-hand knowledge helps
the engineers in their efforts to improve Kodak products
and optimise the recycling process.
Kodak's Single Use Camera
program has clearly enhanced our sustainable development
efforts. It has even led to a formal "Design
for HSE" program within the company. Today, Health,
Safety and Environmental (HSE) opportunities are considered
and practised in all Kodak product development activities
and throughout all product development stages. HSE
experts provide guidance in designs, suggest common
construction materials, and investigate the recycling
and remanufacturing aspects of all new products.
We have designed a special
logo - reprinted above - to symbolise the single-use
camera recycling program. It features green arrows
moving around the globe, and words which read: "Single-Use
Camera Recycling Program. Conserving Resources &
Protecting the Environment."
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