If’s risk engineers have been our extended arm at the facilities

Through a successful long-standing cooperation within the area of loss prevention, Essity and If have been able to monitor and minimize operational risks at the Global hygiene and health company’s manufacturing facilities, decreasing incurred losses and limiting business interruption while at the same time avoiding any environmental impact of damages and repair processes, says Janina Helenius Bylander and Ola Nilsson.

Essity has around 90 manufacturing facilities all over the globe, producing a wide range of hygiene and health related consumer products. These sites, many of which feature heavy machinery operating with high pressures and temperatures, are exposed to different risks. Fires, machinery breakdowns and other types of incidents can all lead to property damage and costly business interruptions, including negative environmental impact.

‘Flammable materials such as dust, waste paper and nonwovens can accumulate around our machinery, posing fire hazards at the production floor. Another concern is our raw material and finished goods storages where, in the event of fire, the risks of a fast spreading fire is high, especially when storing tissue paper, which is why we always install various types of fire protection such as sprinklers and fire walls  and initiate other loss prevention measures wherever deemed necessary’, says Janina Helenius Bylander, Loss Prevention Director at Essity.

As an external provider of risk management service, If works closely together with Essity’s Loss Prevention team to monitor and mitigate risks such as these. Within the service agreement, If’s risk engineers perform annual assessments at the production facilities, resulting in a Risk Survey Report identifying and rating the risk profile at the specific site monitored, and a separate report with preventive and mitigating recommendations addressing the findings.

Equally important for If and Essity’s successful collaboration within loss prevention, however, has been the ongoing dialogue and informational exchange between the risk engineers, the managers and workers on-site and the Loss Prevention team at Essity, according to Ola Nilsson, Vice President of Risk Management and Insurance at the hygiene and health company.

‘Essity has been very successful in its risk and loss prevention work through appropriate risk-mitigating measures and investments, with support from the professionalism in the Essity organization. Planning for those actions, we have valuated If and its experts’ input. In a sense, If’s risk engineers have functioned as our extended arm at our facilities, which has been working very well’, he says.

The Loss Prevention unit within Essity and its support from If also have a function of keeping business-as-usual within the company, enabling Essity to keep focus on its own sustainability efforts, Ola Nilsson adds. 

‘Sustainability is an integrated part of our strategic framework and business model. Through mitigating and preventing damages we facilitate for the group as a whole to keep track of its main target, and thus also of the good sustainability work that is already being carried out within the group’.

Essity

Essity is a leading global hygiene and health company, dedicated to improving well-being through products and services. Sales are conducted in approximately 150 countries under the leading global brands TENA and Tork, and other strong brands, such as JOBST, Leukoplast, Libero, Libresse, Lotus, Nosotras, Saba, Tempo, Vinda and Zewa.

Essity has about 46,000 employees. Net sales in 2019 amounted to approximately SEK 129bn (EUR 12.2bn). The company’s headquarters is located in Stockholm, Sweden, and Essity is listed on Nasdaq Stockholm. Essity breaks barriers to well-being and contributes to a healthy, sustainable and circular society. 

For more information, visit www.essity.com