Environment

Matsuda Sangyo Co., Ltd. has established as our corporate philosophy “making effective use of the limited Earth resources and contributing to society through business.” To that end, we strive to develop and nurture the products and services that customers require by enhancing our customer relationships across all our business activities, included the recovery of precious metals from industrial resources, manufacturing and sale of precious metal products, proper treatment of industrial waste, and precision cleaning of semiconductor manufacturing equipment.
With the desire to realize our vision, “For human happiness and a beautiful Earth,” we recognize that conserving the environment of the Earth, our homeland, is one of the most important issues confronting all humankind. Based on this recognition, we shall engage in activities with consideration for its maintenance throughout all aspects of our business activities.

Based on the Basic Philosophy, Matsuda Sangyo Co., Ltd. has established the following items as our Quality and Environmental Policy. We shall make it our framework for setting quality and environmental objectives and strive to achieve them with the participation of all employees.

1. Customer Satisfaction First and Securing the Trust of Society
   We shall grasp customer requirements quickly and accurately and to provide satisfactory quality across all the aspects of delivery timeline, price, and service, as well as to provide accurate information about our products and services. All employees shall recognize this and act accordingly.
    
2. Compliance Focus
   We shall clarify the laws and the regulations that are applicable to our business activities, products, and services as well as their environmental aspects, alongside other requirements that are required by our customers and other stakeholders. All employees shall recognize these and ensure thorough compliance.
    
3. Striking a Balance between Reducing Environmental Burden and Business Growth
   We shall strive to reduce our environmental burden, including the prevention of pollution, by conducting environmental due diligence related to our business activities, products and services, establishing management standards to mitigate identified risks, and implementing these standards with the active participation of all employees.
   Furthermore, we shall address important environmental issues surrounding our company, such as global warming countermeasures, establishing a circular society, and conserving biodiversity, and we shall strive to enhance our corporate value toward the realization of a sustainable society.
    
4. Proper Management of Hazardous Chemical Substances
   We shall properly manage the procurement, use, and contamination prevention of chemical substances regulated by laws and regulations, and by our customers and other stakeholders.
   In using chemical substances that have an impact on the human body and the environment, we shall accurately grasp the risks, define management standards on their handling, storage, movement, and disposal, and manage them properly.
    
5. Accomplishment of the Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) Cycle
   We shall strive to enhance our quality and environmental performance by establishing and operating an integrated quality and environment management system, and to improve this integrated management system continually by checking the outcomes through periodic management reviews.

This Quality and Environmental Policy shall be reviewed in consideration with its outcomes, changes to the situation surrounding our company, and changes to the needs of our customers and other stakeholders.

This policy applies to Matsuda Sangyo Co., Ltd.’s domestic Precious Metals Business Segment.

April 1, 2025
KOJI TSUSHIMA
Executive Vice President
Matsuda Sangyo Co., Ltd.

The Matsuda Sangyo Group has decided on its important environmental issues as set out below, and will strive to reduce environmental burden in its business activities going forward.

(1) Energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions

(2) Emissions into atmosphere

(3) Hazardous substances

(4) Solid waste

(5) Pollution prevention and resource reduction

(6) Water management

(7) Biodiversity

Matsuda Sangyo supplies the following products manufactured using 100% recycled gold as raw material:

• Potassium Gold Cyanide (Product name: ECO PGC 683)
• Sodium Gold Sulfite (Product name: ECO Auro Assist 100)
• Granular Gold (Product name: ECO EMG GOLD 100)

 
In addition, we obtained certification from UL Japan*, an independent third-party organization, ahead of other domestic manufacturers. Going forward, we will continue to expand the product lineup of the “ECO Series,” manufactured using 100% recycled precious metals with low carbon dioxide emissions, thereby promoting resource circulation and contributing to our customers’ sustainability initiatives through the reduction of environmental impact.
 
* Certification from UL Japan confirms, based on the standards established by UL LLC in the United States, that the products of the “ECO Series” are manufactured using 100% recycled gold.

Granular Gold

(Product name: ECO EMG GOLD 100)
 

Abnormal weather conditions are now intensifying around the world as a result of climate change, and these are having a severe impact on nature and human society. Scientific studies led by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have pointed out the strong possibility that it may no longer be possible to halt global warming if the average temperature rise of the world is not suppressed to 1.5℃ below pre-industrial levels (around 1850).
The Matsuda Sangyo Group perceives climate change response, which leads to the realization of a sustainable society, as the mission of our company. In December 2023, we acquired certification for the SBT 1.5℃ target^*1, and we have set decarbonization targets for 2030 and 2050, which we are working on toward the realization of carbon neutrality.
In addition, in line with the TCFD^*2 recommendations, we are first working to quantify the financial impacts in order to reflect the risks and opportunities of climate change in our business activities.
Furthermore, we continue to proactively disclose information to CDP^*3, and in 2024 we received the highest rating of “A” in both the CDP Climate Change Program and the CDP SEA (Supplier Engagement Assessment).

*1 Science-based GHG emissions reduction target
*2 Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures, established by the Financial Stability Board to promote information disclosure of climate-related risks and opportunities
*3 A non-governmental organization (NGO) managed by a British charity that evaluates the initiatives and information disclosure by companies and local governments in the environmental field in three areas: climate change, water resources, and forest protection.
 

Our Group positions climate change and decarbonization initiatives as one of our materiality issues, and is advancing efforts in this respect. As a part of these efforts, we have indicated our agreement to the recommendations of the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) in October 2022.

Under this item, we have disclosed important climate change-related information (governance, strategy, risk management, indicators, and targets) based on the TCFD recommendations.

With a view to striking a balance between the realization of a sustainable environment, society, and economy, and enhancing the corporate value of the Matsuda Sangyo Group, we established the Sustainability Committee in May 2022 under the direct supervision of the Board of Directors, for the purpose of facilitating the promotion of decisions and initiatives on important matters related to ESG and SDGs.

The Sustainability Committee is composed of the Directors (including Outside Directors) and members nominated by the Board of Directors from among the Executive Officers. The President and Representative Director chairs the Committee, assisted by the Executive Vice President as the Vice-Chairperson of the Committee. The CSR/IR Dept. serves as the secretariat overseeing the overall management and operation of initiatives related to ESG and SDGs.

The roles of the Sustainability Committee are as follows: (1) Formulation of overall policy; (2) Deciding on important matters that should be addressed; (3) Evaluation of risks and opportunities; (4) Setting of targets; (5) Formulation of action plans and development of systems; (6) Monitoring of initiatives. It convenes regular meetings four times a year in principle.

The Chair of the Sustainability Committee is responsible for ESG and SDGs initiatives, and reports on activity status and other matters to the Board of Directors and Audit & Supervisory Committee through the Secretariat.

The Board of Directors checks and supervises the important matters decided upon by the Sustainability Committee, including processes, while keeping in mind the need to strike a balance between social trends, particularly recommendations by international initiatives as well as domestic and overseas policies, with the business growth of the Matsuda Sangyo Group. The important matters related to climate change are resolved upon discussion by the Sustainability Committee and reported to the Board of Directors.

*Please refer to the Corporate Governance Structure for details on the governance system.

The Matsuda Sangyo Group has established “striking a balance between reducing environmental burden and business growth” as an important sustainability issue in the Medium-term Management Plan (FY2022–2025) announced in May 2022. With regard to reducing environmental burden, we view the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions as a particularly important theme, and have conducted reviews on initiatives toward setting and achieving targets in line with the science-based targets  (SBT)* approach that is consistent with climate scenario analysis and science. These contents were discussed and decided upon by the Sustainability Committee in July 2022. Going forward, we will continue to review response measures to climate-related risks and opportunities, and to monitor the progress of initiatives toward the achievement of targets.

*Greenhouse gas emission reduction target based on scientific evidence

In climate scenario analysis, we set out two hypothetical scenarios: the 1.5℃ scenario with increased risks for transitioning to a low-carbon/decarbonized society, and the 4℃ scenario with increased physical risks accompanying climate change without achieving low-carbon/decarbonization goals. Based on these, we select the key drivers for our corporate Group and extract, evaluate, and identify the risks and opportunities.

With regard to the results of this analysis, the validity of the evaluation is checked and shared within the Sustainability Committee after an exchange of opinions with the relevant Executive Officers.

 (Reference information for the scenarios)

• International Energy Agency (IEA), “World Energy Outlook ,” 2021
• IPCC, “Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5℃ ,” 1998
• IPCC, “Special Report on Climate Change and Land ,” 1999
• Ministry of the Environment, “Report on the Market Size and Employment of the Environmental Industry, ” 2021
• World Resources Institute (WRI), “Aqueduct Water Risk Atlas 3.0,” 2019

The Matsuda Sangyo Group has established the Total Risk Management (TRM) Committee to identify the actualization of risks that have a serious impact on our business and corporate management (compliance, environment, disaster, quality, information security, credit management, commodity market prices, foreign exchange control, etc.), and to manage them as company-wide risks.

The TRM Committee, as an advisory body of the President and Representative Director, is an organization chaired by the Director and Senior Managing Executive Officer (see diagram below). It evaluates potential risks, carries out centralized management of company-wide risks, promotes response, and monitors the management status, among other activities, then reports the results of the activities to the Board of Directors and Audit and Supervisory Committee.

The standard for risk evaluation is based on references such as the relevant laws and regulations and international standards, IEA’s “World Energy Outlook 2021,” IPCC’s “Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5℃” (1998), and the probability of occurrence and degree of impact of potential risks are evaluated for each business and region. Company-wide risks that should be addressed as priority are identified. Through this method, we comprehensively evaluate the business risks of the corporate Group, and formulate the response policy for risks of high priority.

With regard to climate-related risks, we have drawn up two hypothetical scenarios (1.5℃ scenario, 4℃ scenario), based on which we select the key drivers for our corporate group, and extract and evaluate risks and opportunities. The Sustainability Committee then verifies them and identify the risks.

The risks identified will be integrated into the risk management system of the TRM Committee in the future, and we plan to promote responses and monitor progress in an expert subcommittee established for the purpose of managing the risks recognized as important to the business and corporate management, and which require company-wide and medium- to long-term management from an expert viewpoint. The expert subcommittee under the TRM Committee formulates the response policy to the high-priority risks identified by the Sustainability Committee as well as the annual plans, reports the progress monitoring results at the regular meeting held every month, and provides feedback on the contents of consultation, etc. to the executive departments (risk management system chart).

*Matsuda Sangyo has established a corporate governance system in preparation for risk management.
*Refer to “Corporate Governance Initiatives: Organizational Chart of Corporate Governance, Organizational Chart of the TRM Committee.”

The Matsuda Sangyo Group established its greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets for the whole corporate group in July 2022.

These targets are aligned with the science-based target (SBT)* of 1.5℃, and we have also committed to the Science-Based Targets initiative (SBTi).

Going forward, in addition to acquiring SBT certification, we will also strive to reduce emissions (greenhouse gas emissions reduction target).

*Greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets based on scientific grounds
 

 (Main measures toward reduction)

• Improve energy consumption efficiency
• Expand the adoption of renewable energy
• Review and improve manufacturing and treatment processes

(including fuel conversion, CO_{2} capture)

• Introduce and update high-efficiency facilities
• Enhance the efficiency of logistics, modal shift
• Provide eco-friendly products and services
• Cooperation through engagement with the supply chain