Introduction to Orion Group’s Sustainability Report 2009

As of 2010, Orion Corporation will report regularly on topics related to Orion’s sustainable development. The new Responsibility section of Orion’s website will serve as the main reporting channel. As part of responsibility reporting, Orion will monitor and report on relevant and applicable sustainability and performance indicators in line with the globally adopted GRI (Global Reporting Initiative) reporting guidelines and framework. Since there currently is no Sector Supplement available for the pharmaceutical industry, Orion includes some additional organisation-specific indicators in its reporting.

As year 2007 was the first full operational year for the current Orion Corporation after the demerger of the former Orion in the summer of 2006, the first report covers the operations of the present Orion Group for the calendar years 2007−2009. From 2011 onwards, we will review our corporate sustainability development in periods of five years.

Orion publishes sustainability reports only on its website as part of the content in the Responsibility section. The report will not be available in printed format. The Responsibility section is available in Finnish and English, as other main sections of the website.

Product safety is the key
topic of corporate responsibility at Orion

As a company specialising in healthcare products, Orion places special emphasis on the role of responsibility as a natural and inherent part of all its operations. Since we manufacture pharmaceuticals and diagnostic products, responsibility primarily manifests itself as product responsibility. As regards pharmaceuticals, all the relevant parties – the patient taking the medicine, the prescribing doctor and the dispensing pharmacist – must be able to trust that the information provided by Orion concerning the composition, use and safety of the product is accurate, the packaged product is authentic and manufactured in compliance with laws and regulations. As regards diagnostic products, the doctor must be able to rely on the results yielded by the diagnostic test and method so that he or she can reliably assess the patient’s condition, start the best possible treatment and evaluate the patient's progress with follow-up tests. It is most fundamental to Orion’s existence as a company that, when used correctly, our products are safe and that we make no mistakes which challenge product and patient safety.

No medicine comes without
adverse effects

In a compliant pharmaceutical company, the culture of responsibility and care is a pervasive starting point for all operations. To ensure product safety, we use standard operating procedures throughout the manufacturing, quality assurance and supply chain and issue instructions for the correct and appropriate dosage and use of our products. No pharmaceutical company in the world can offer products that have zero adverse effects, nor do the healthcare authorities demand it. Medicines are chemically and biologically acting complex compounds. Their mechanisms of action in our bodies are very sophisticated and involve questions which still remain for the scientists to resolve. However, thanks to modern technology, reporting on adverse effects is very effective, and we are today better equipped than ever to react quickly to any alarming signals.

The summary of product characteristics and patient leaflets supplied with product packages can sometimes include very long lists of adverse events reported when using the product – in fact, these lists may seem worryingly long for a layman. The lists are lengthy because they include all the adverse and side effects reported already during the research and development stage of the product, and the lists are complemented with additional data reported from clinical use. When necessary, a medicine is withdrawn from market if the adverse effects prove so serious, or even dangerous that they undermine the beneficial effect of the medicine in the purpose it is indicated for.

Orion’s corporate responsibility
builds on individual performance and attitudes

Even at Group-level, Orion’s responsibility builds on the operation, working methods and attitudes of individual employees. Each and every Orion employee is committed to the Group’s Code of Conduct regardless of the country or culture they work in.
We also expect our partners to commit to our responsibility goals and to acknowledge the principles of our Code of Conduct.

Orion considers responsibility
a pillar of sustainable business

Responsibility is a vitally important principle for a company such as Orion. Without it, our operation would lose its basis. Without a strong commitment to responsibility, we would allow both ourselves and our partners to take shortcuts and make compromises.

Orion cares about its stakeholders: patients who use our products to promote their health, healthcare professionals who treat the patients, distributors who ensure the availability of our products, providers of products and services who participate in the development and manufacturing of our products, Orion employees, their families, our neighbours and our shareholders. By operating in a careful and exemplary manner and upholding regulatory compliance we can ensure a bright future for Orion and its stakeholders and manifest credible dedication to building well-being.

Why report
on responsibility?

Pharmaceutical industry is very heavily regulated. Regulatory instructions and their monitoring cover the entire supply chain and operations. To be able to be in the business, a pharmaceutical company has to organise its operations according to strict regulations and manage quality and safety matters accordingly.

An Orion medicine package that finds its way to a consumer’s home from the pharmacy does not reveal how exactly Orion looks after its corporate responsibility. The package does not indicate how Orion has developed and manufactured the preparation or delivered it to the pharmacy, or what requirements the product had to meet to be approved for use by patients. The purpose of this report is to shed more light on our economic, social and environmental performance.  A group of specialists are responsible for gathering, storing and maintaining information related to Orion’s sustainability performance to ensure that we can report on our corporate responsibility as sustainably as way we operate.

Challenges related to the further development
of relevant management approaches

With the launch of corporate responsibility reporting, our senior management has faced new types of questions. While compiling answers to the questions posed by the GRI reporting guidelines, we have realised that many of our responsibility related internal guidelines, procedures and statistics are more or less location or unit specific in the Group. The question then becomes whether we have Group-wide standards in place. What are they? How do we see to it that they are attended to? And how do we ensure that our employees commit to them? Some items were not addressable to the scope of a Group-wide responsibility area of any OEMB member with a direct reporting responsibility to the CEO included.

As we are only just starting responsibility reporting, we do not have overall targets for corporate responsibility in place yet, nor development programmes with interim objectives. As responsibility becomes more pronounced in our strategy, our reporting will likely include development programmes and follow-up meters which focus on responsibility.

While considering responsibility questions, we at Orion have also realised that we have set the bar quite high for ourselves and tend to be quite critical. Things we see as business as usual and therefore not worth mentioning may to an outsider be something special in terms of responsibility. We welcome feedback from report readers to help us better identify such areas.

While setting up responsibility reporting at Orion, we have realised that exemplary corporate responsibility means much, much more than impeccable regulatory compliance.

Anne Allo
Orion Corporation
Communications