Environmental Communications

Our environmental communications are addressed to many of our stakeholders: customers, employees, business partners, dealers, the financial world and many others. The focus is on the Volkswagen Group as a company which is aware of its responsibilities and on its activities. Our intention is to create transparency and raise awareness of environmental protection issues. On the one hand, we are addressing an outside audience, mainly our customers, the interested general public and potential customers and our dealers: we aim to interest these groups in fuel-efficient, environmentally sensitive vehicles and to familiarise them with approaches to mobility with which we will all be able to move into the future. On the other hand, we are addressing our employees, the people who make and sell our products. They are our most important multipliers on environmental issues.

Communicating environmental issues to the outside world
Most of our brands publish information about the challenges of sustainability, their activities and outstanding examples in their own reports and on their websites. In order to document our commitment to the environment and foster ecologically sound behaviour on the part of customers and other interested parties, the Volkswagen brand has created a roadshow that will tour 150 dealerships and attend major events throughout Germany between mid June and the end of September 2007.

On the Road to Sustainability
Under the slogan "Taking responsibility. Volkswagen and CO2" we provide general information about the issue of CO2 in the roadshow. In cooperation with Naturschutzbund Deutschland (NABU - German Society for Nature Conservation), we also provide everyday advice and fuel-saving tips to cut CO2 emissions. The shows also feature the latest low-consumption vehicles, such as the BlueMotion diesel models, and our Group-wide Powertrain and Fuel Strategy. All the information is also available in a comprehensive brochure for customers.
 
Back to school on the environment
In connection with the launch of the new Golf Estate, we conducted nationwide training for salespeople in May 2007. Key features of this training included the current status of the climate debate, our BlueMotion sustainability initiative and our Powertrain and Fuel Strategy. Across Germany, we provided training for a total of some 5,000 salespeople.

Commendation for environmental performance
To meet many customers' growing desire to adopt a responsible attitude to the environment, we now endeavour to present a full and clear picture of the environmental characteristics of our products. This is why we have introduced an ecological product certificate known as an "Environmental Commendation" which helps us to convincingly present the environmental characteristics of our models and so position our brands. For those products certified with the Environmental Commendation, we document environmental data throughout the product's life cycle, thereby creating transparency and enhancing comparability of the product's environmental impact. The Environmental Commendation is independently certified and, from 2007, will initially apply to the Passat. Further models will gradually follow. Product declarations of this type are set to become increasingly important, especially in the field of public procurement, in connection with the EU sustainability strategy.

Employees make it possible
We depend on our employees' commitment for the implementation of our in-process environmental targets. Environmental Officers coordinate environmental protection measures at the individual plants while at all German plants, every department which operates facilities and equipment with potential environmental impacts also has its own specially trained environmental specialist on hand to act as the point of contact in all environment-related matters.

Environmental training for all
Training to promote factory-wide awareness of in-process environmental protection issues includes training programmes at the Environment Service Centre for our trainees and apprentices and continuing professional development courses for our other employees. In 2007, the internal Volkswagen Environmental Award was presented for the fourth time. Its purpose is to commend and reward employees who take a proactive approach to environmental protection in their own particular sector. Our dedication to environmental education is not limited to our own employees. With our initiative at schools in China, Volkswagen is making a significant contribution to solving the major environmental problems in this rapidly developing country. Our charitable activities play a key role in this process.

Learning from each other across borders
Our Regional Conferences are an important tool within the Group's environmental structures. They take place every three years in a different country outside Europe and enable the transfer of ideas and best practice.

Copybook communication
Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles' Polish plant in Poznan provides a copybook example of effective internal environmental communications. Since November 2006, environment specialists at Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles have been arranging regular meetings with members of other departments to tie in operational issues with the environmental management system at the plant and promote discussions.