The companies in the Novo Group maintain the position as best in class, when it comes to non-financial reporting. For the second consecutive year, the Danish Association of Chartered Accountants and the Danish business daily, Børsen, have pointed to Novo as the winner of “best sustainability report” for the 2000 environmental and social report ‘Values in a Global Context’ published this Spring.

The prize for best sustainability report was awarded the first time in 2000, where Novo also won the prize for the report ‘Values in practice’. The award committee motivated its choice of Novo again this year by saying that "Novo is one of the front-runners in sustainability reporting and is a key player in developing the emerging global sustainability reporting standard, Global Reporting Initiative (GRI)".

"We are very proud to receive this award - particularly for the second time. It is a recognition of the great effort made by many people in our organisation as they work to protect the environment and show social responsibility in their everyday activities," says Lise Kingo, senior vice president in Novo Nordisk and responsible for Novo’s reporting in this field since the company published the first environmental report in Denmark in 1994.

"The reports are one of the ways we try to initiate our surroundings into how values drive the activities in the Novo companies. With our common values and the obligations we have signed internationally as the starting point, we work with what we have chosen to call the triple bottom line: To balance environmental awareness, social responsibility and a economic viability in every business decision we make. To us, this is the very basis of driving and developing our company", ends Lise Kingo.

The report gives an account of how the two companies in the group, Novo Nordisk and Novozymes, build on the experience accumulated through ten years of working with sustainable development. The report deals with issues of societal interest, in which the companies play an important part and can make a difference, eg, social responsibility, human rights and equal opportunities, the right to health, gene technology, environmental accounting and animal welfare. It documents the results the companies have achieved in year 2000. Finally, it reveals the new targets and focus areas that have been chosen for the coming years.