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Sustainability Report 2015 – Economy

“I see SEKEM as a resistance model against the craze of growth and prosperity – as well as the craze of money and avarice.”

SEKEMs economic year 2015 was strongly characterized by reliable partnerships and supporters. Since the Egyptian revolution SEKEMs companies had to face various challenges. But thanks to a reliable and committed network of partners, who continuously supported SEKEM, even though they were aware of the difficulties, SEKEM is getting back on track.

“It is clear to us now, that you have to experience SEKEM yourself to really understand its relevance. Reconciling Muslim and European culture, sustainable agriculture and professional production, work and life in the SEKEM community is unique.”

Tino Nitsch, Davert GmbH

SEKEMs shareholder remained with the initiative and even supported the acquisition of new partners. In 2015, SEKEM organized a shareholder visit: Several SEKEM supporters from Europe traveled to the land of the pyramids and pharaohs and convinced themselves of SEKEMS sustainable business practice.

SEKEMs partner company Davert that successfully distributes SEKEM products in Germany visited the SEKEM Farm. Together, SEKEM and Davert developed a wide range of great Organic products that have been presented at the 2015’s “Biofach”, the leading fair for the Organic sector in Europe.

“It is my passion to communicate with people and to convince them of the value of something good.”

To foster the trust of the local market and to improve quality, SEKEM monitored its presence through a reliable customer service department.

All in all, SEKEM focused in 2015 on stability, resilience and healthy growth. The SEKEM Group of Companies started to rethink and develop its management structure to foster autonomy and decentralization. By defining new leading and organizational structures, the individual companies shall benefit from more efficiency and sustainability.

ISIS Organic keeps its position as one of the biggest and most successful Organic companies in the Middle East. The enterprise opened a new bottling plant for ISIS table water in February, which has been running very prosperous in 2015.

“We have chosen a special bottle design to distinguish ourselves from the other producers of bottled water.”

Mamdouh Abou El Eish, GM, ISIS Organic

economy-indicators-01

Read further details in Indicator Sheet here

SEKEMs company Lotus could accomplish its objectives in 2015. Different new products have been added to the production, such as the currently very popular crops chia and quinoa as well as jojoba oil. Read about Mohamed Abd El Ghany.

ATOS Pharma had a difficult start into 2015. After hiring a new General Manager and investing in trainings for employees and sales staff, the situation became better from month to month. At the end of the year the company started the production of different diagnostic items, for instance a device for testing the infection of Helicobacter pylori bacterium or Hepatitis C virus, a pregnancy test or a drug screening test. All these devices have been imported until now and ATOS Pharma will be the first national company producing and marketing diagnostic tests in the coming year.

Likewise, NatureTex faced difficulties in the first half of 2015, while managed to get back on track afterwards. New product lines have been developed and the co-workers have been supported by many trainings and social activities.

Sustainable Business Practice

SEKEM Agriculture did not initiate new investments in 2015 but could manage to bear all costs independently. To support sustainable business practice of other companies in Egypt that are engaged to agriculture SEKEM developed, together with partners, a Self-Assessment Tool based on the existing Sustainability Flower framework. The system is called Sustainability Flower Self-Assessment Tool and is available as an easy-to-use online tool.

ATOS Pharma

Consolidated Business Performance 2015

 

Even though SEKEM increased its sales, the Profit Before Tax as well as the Profit for the Year are below last year, as there has been a loss in books due to the devaluation of the US Dollar and Euro at the end of 2015.