Annual Report 2005/06 - voestalpine

In January 2006, a newly built center for
training and continuing education, “Forum.
Zukunft”, which represents an investment
of roughly EUR 12 million, was opened at
the Linz location (Division Steel). This center
has the largest and most modern industrial
apprentice workshop in Austria and
offers 50% more capacity. As of March 31,
2006, 410 young people, 10% of whom are
girls, are being trained in Linz in 20 different
vocations. Group-wide, there are about
800 apprentices enrolled in training
programs, 80% of whom are being trained
at locations in Austria, while 20% are trained
at locations abroad.
The difficulty in inspiring a sufficient number
of qualified, young employees to seek training
in technical professions is not just an
Austrian problem, but has led to increasing
recruiting efforts in other countries as well,
such as, for example, in Great Britain and
the Netherlands. The British Group company,
Metsec plc (Division Profilform), also
opened a state-of-the-art apprentice training
center early in the new business year. In the
new “Metsec Apprentice Training Centre,”
the four-year apprenticeship provides young
people with practical on-the-job training,
theoretical knowledge, as well as personal
and social development skills. The Dutch
voestalpine Polynorm Group has also implemented
extensive initiatives in this sector;
currently, it employs 70 apprentices and is
thus one of the largest training operations
in the Group.
environmenT
In the 2005/06 business year, the environmentally
relevant investments of the voestalpine
Group amounted to about EUR 50
million, whereby the focus was on projects
within the scope of the implementation of
the “Linz 2010” investment program (Division
Steel). The Group-wide operating
costs continued to be high at about EUR 170
million.
Investments in environmental protection
measures focused primarily on a continued
reduction of the dust and nitrogen oxide
emissions in steel production. The
voestalpine Group has therefore taken extensive
measures, particularly at the Linz
site, and will reduce the dust and/or particulate
matter emissions at this site by
another 60% by the end of 2007, despite a
25% increase in the production capacity and
although these emissions had already been
reduced by about 80% during the 1990s.
After having completed appropriate measures
in the steel plant and the sintering
plant, construction of a dedusting system in
the casting bay for the two blast furnaces
was started at the Donawitz location in order
to further improve the air quality in the
Leoben-Donawitz area (Division Railway
Systems). Start-up of operations of this
facility, which will effect another significant
reduction in diffuse dust emissions at the
site, is planned for late 2006.
Management Report
Annual Report 2005/06
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