Governance
The Pfizer Ltd Board has the primary responsibility for all environmental, health and safety matters. The Board sets policy and provides resources to ensure the requirements of policy are met.
This is supported by a Safety, Health and Environment (SHE) Board, which is chaired by a member of the Pfizer Ltd Board and comprises senior UK staff including the heads of the divisional EHS departments. The SHE Board monitors EHS performance, reviews detailed EHS technical matters and makes recommendations to the Pfizer Ltd Board regarding, amongst other matters, policy review and development. At operational level Environmental Health and Safety (EHS) committees, comprising departmental staff, review day-to-day EHS performance.
Policy
The EHS policy reflects our core Purpose, Mission and Values and has been set by the Pfizer Ltd SHE Board to be applied equally to each operating division. It gives our Commitment to EHS matters as a highest priority, placing legislative requirements as a minimum standard.
Our Management techniques include adopting industry best practice to prevent accidents and maximise protection of the environment. We strive for Continual Improvement through adoption of effective management systems including the setting of improvement objectives and targets where appropriate. Not least is the vital part People play in delivering excellence in EHS, including our employees and contractors.
Our policy reflects the need to provide effective communication, systems of works and training. Furthermore, we recognise the need to communicate with parties that have an interest in our activities such as local communities and it is our policy to maintain a dialogue with them. The policy has recently been revised to meet the requirements of the Environmental Management Standard ISO 14001 and to reflect a number of other best practice codes to which we subscribe.
You can download a PDF version of our policy by clicking here.
Management Systems
Our EHS management systems follow a set of guidelines established at the Pfizer corporate level. These have been implemented locally, taking into account UK legislative requirements as a minimum and in many cases exceeding these requirements.
Our systems include aspects such as compliance with legislative requirements, minimising and managing waste, process safety, occupational health, energy conservation, protection of ground and surface water and community outreach. Audits are carried out with regard to the implementation of the guidelines both by site-based EHS Staff and by our Corporate Head Office.
During the last three years, audits carried out by our Corporate Audits teams have confirmed that our facilities continue to be managed and operated to very high standards. The audit team will be next auditing our manufacturing operation during 2005 and return to Sandwich in 2006 to review our Research and Development facility.
As already noted, we have been successful in gaining formal accreditation to the externally and internationally recognised management systems standard ISO 14001. Our commitment to extend this and the equivalent safety standard across our R&D organisation has included the recruitment of additional staff to the EHS Department within Research and Development to support line management in reaching this goal.
Our performance
For detailed information on Pfizer’s environmental performance please refer to our “Environment, Health and Safety – Annual Report 2007” at: http://www.pfizer-ehs.co.uk/