Leather chemicals manufacturer Royal Smit & Zoon has taken a significant step toward a more a sustainable leather value chain by implementing a long-term Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) program for its leather chemicals portfolio. With high-quality LCA data now available for the majority of its core-range products, the company unlocks a key opportunity to turn sustainability ambitions into actionable, data-driven decision-making. Royal Smit & Zoon believes that building a future‑proof leather industry requires more than good intentions. It demands scientific rigour, reliable data and a long‑term commitment to continuous improvement. This underpins the Company’s comprehensive Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) program, with the ambition to have LCA data available for 90% of its core‑range products by 2030. What is a Life Cycle Assessment – and why does it matter? An LCA is a recognized scientific method to quantitatively analyze the environmental impacts of products and services throughout their life cycle from raw material extraction through production, use, and disposal (“cradle to grave”). The Royal Smit & Zoon (RSZ) product LCAs have a “cradle-to-gate” scope, covering 19 environmental impacts up to the product leaving the factory gate – not only carbon footprint (global warming potential), but also for example water use, resource depletion and toxicity indicators. This way, the Company’s LCAs truly reflect the whole picture of the product’s environmental impact, avoiding biased decision making in the leather value chain where more impact categories are of crucial importance. Moreover, LCA data provide a holistic view that supports informed choices across innovation, operations, supply‑chain engagement and customer collaboration and enable the Company to: Identify environmental impact hotspots. Steer continuous improvement based on quantitative insights. Guide innovation towards meaningful multi-impact reductions. Provide credible, decision-ready data. Dr. Yujie Ma Principal Scientist What this enables for customers? In customer dialogue, three priorities consistently emerge: innovative products with lower environmental impact, reliable quantitative data, and close collaboration across the value chain. The Company’s LCA roadmap directly supports these needs, and our focus on cradle-to-gate product LCAs enables multi-impact assessment beyond carbon footprint. Today, Royal Smit & Zoon can provide portfolio‑level LCA insights enabling customers to use primary data, work with customers to reduce impacts of their key products and jointly develop data‑driven improvement projects. “Our customers are increasingly asked to provide reliable, high-quality environmental data,” says Principal Scientist Dr Yujie Ma. “With our LCA data, we support them with credible, high-quality input that strengthens their own decision-making, impact assessments and reporting.” By having these data available, the Company enables tanneries, brands and OEMs to better understand and manage environmental impacts in leather production and meet industry and regulatory requirements faster and with higher confidence. Pilot with partners Over the past year, we ran an LCA pilot together with selected partners. Testing our approach and data confirmed robustness of our program till date and insights support our continuous improvement approach. Learnings from this pilot are now being used to scale up our LCA work across the core-range portfolio. Looking ahead LCAs are a key topic in the Royal Smit & Zoon “Drops of Difference” Sustainability Strategy, reflecting the Company’s wider commitment to deliver sustainable solutions and contribute to sustainable leather making. By 2030, the Company’s ambition is to have LCA data available for 90% of its’ core-range products. While expanding LCA coverage remains important, Royal Smit & Zoon’s 2030 ambition is fundamentally defined by methodological consistency, strong governance, continuous improvement of data quality, and the ability to demonstrate measurable environmental impact improvements – across the entire leather value chain – over time. Call for collaboration A more sustainable leather industry must be built collectively, anchored in reliable data, transparency and shared accountability across the value chain. By combining technical expertise with high-quality data, the company aims to drive impact where it matters most. Royal Smit & Zoon will continue to expand and improve its LCA dataset and work closely with customers and partners to apply these insights in practice. “Creating a more sustainable leather industry is a shared responsibility,” says Aukje Berden. “With this program, we want to share our expertise, our data and our willingness to learn together – and we welcome partners from across the value chain to engage with us on our LCA program.” Aukje Berden Sustainability & Marketing Director More information For more information about the LCA program or to explore collaboration, please view our dedicated webpage, including a FAQ and 1 pager summary on LCA’s. Alternatively, contact us via [email protected]. 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