The first day of the 2nd GPCA Sustainability Conference focused on two pillars that build sustainability; people and the economy.

In an introductory movie, GPCA presented the concept of sustainability, process of interaction between its elements, challenges facing the petrochemical industry, current efforts done in the area and future requirements.

In his opening speech, Abdulwahab Al-Sadoun, GPCA secretary general, said: “Sustainability is a topic being defined and redefined; sustainability will develop from a concept to a business imperative.”

In her keynote speech, Margerete Suckale, BASF board member, took the audience through a journey of BASF history. She explained the aspects of sustainability at BASF specifically and in Germany generally. “Worldwide, we are on the same track to maintain sustainability,” she said. “We in Germany have our structure through the Verbunds (association), which combines positioning, performance and perspective.”

Sustainability will become more important by 2050 as the population will have reached the 9 billion mark. “Our population in Europe will not grow, but major growth will be in Asia and Africa.”

The mega trends, Suckale said, are population increase, middle class growth, aging and urbanization. The challenge will be balancing economic and environmental needs of society with regard to achieving sustainability.

“Our stakeholders expect us to make profit as well. At BASF we have established a department to integrate sustainability in our system. We increase the sustainability of our solutions by categorizing our products into four parts: substantial contribution, meet basic sustainability, specific sustainability and significant sustainability.”

On the status of sustainability in the GCC, Musab Al-Mahruqi, CEO ORPIC, said that not all of the GCC is on the same level. Yet, “the GCC region has done a lot in regards to sustainability.”

Abdulrahman Al-Jawahery, president of GPIC Bahrain, said he was delighted to see key people from the industry attending this event.