Suffice to say that, here at Vreugdenhil Dairy Foods, we are more than happy to engage in good dialogue about dairy, milk powder, and sustainability. The choice for Dairy Dialogue as the theme for this 2021 sustainability report is in keeping with the phase that our organisation has reached in the transition to sustainability. Sustainability has been interwoven into our day-to-day operations for over 10 years, is a topical issue, and will only develop further.

Over the past period, our new Sustainability Manager, Ilonka Nennie (whose name will come up regularly throughout this sustainability report), and internal and external stakeholders have worked hard on a new sustainability agenda that can count on broad support across the organisation. This agenda, which will be covered in this report, is part of Vreugdenhil Dairy Foods’ overall Marathon 25 strategy. A good plan for the future that helps us achieve our long-term goals. As a company, we have opted to ground our sustainability agenda on a broad base of support, which was confirmed largely by the outcome of the materiality analysis in which we processed responses from over 130 stakeholders.

Sustainability, Creating Shared Value calls for a long-term vision. Our climate ambition is to be carbon neutral from grass to glass by 2050. A joint approach across the supply chain is essential in making this happen. Dialogue with our stakeholders forms the basis for a shared ambition with clear goals for the future. This is how sustainability is gradually embedded more at Vreugdenhil.

As a family business, Vreugdenhil Dairy Foods is sustainable from the ground up. Based on our vision on sustainability, we take our responsibility: People, planet and profit are inseparably intertwined with our company, the people who make the company, and our sustainability ambitions,
as confirmed by the results of the employee engagement survey. Despite the fact that our employees have several highly challenging Covid-19 years behind them, they say in the survey that they feel committed to Vreugdenhil and that they work to their satisfaction in a safe environment. We are very proud of these survey results.

We would like to thank our employees and all stakeholders in our supply chain, ranging from dairy farmers and suppliers to customers. Your commitment and trust enables us to keep our performance levels up, which is consistent with our ambition to bring you the best of milk, every day and anywhere in the world.

We hope you enjoy reading this annual report.

Jan Vreugdenhil, DirectorAlbert de Groot, CEO