SUSTAINABILITY REPORT - Landcom

JOINT STATEMENT
FROM THE
CHAIRMAN AND MANAGING DIRECTOR
OUR CULTURE
The fact that we strive to integrate our social, environmental
and financial responsibilities provides the real point of difference
between Landcom and many developers constrained by purely
commercial motives.
It seems that everyone is talking about sustainability. And rightly so. At Landcom, sustainable
development permeates every aspect of our business. We believe a bright future awaits those
organisations that adopt its practices and promote its benefits.
As a government-owned property developer we have a specific responsibility to be, and to be seen
to be, a good corporate citizen and to lead by example. At the same time it is our responsibility
to implement the New South Wales Government’s urban management policies. These imperatives
include quality urban design, sustainable development, social justice, affordable housing and
community development.
A glance at our summary results page for the past year reveals that we have progressed on our start
of two years ago in many areas, yet we still have a lot of work to do. In particular, the impact of our
business on the conservation of native vegetation is proving to be quite a challenge.
There is no denying we have an impact on native vegetation. Our business is urban development and
regardless of all the attention to careful planning, Sydney’s major growth corridors are located in areas
of Cumberland Plain Woodland. This means we must reconcile our growing population’s social needs
for adequate and affordable housing with pressing environmental needs to conserve biodiversity.
CHAIR/MD
We also need to find more effective ways of measuring community
satisfaction with the facilities we provide within our estates, and
with the sustainable practices and products we offer.
The areas where we feel we can “take a bow” include water
management, housing affordability, energy efficiency, recycling
of building materials and conservation of indigenous and
non-indigenous heritage. However, the nature of sustainable
development means the tasks do not get easier with practice.
We don’t claim any special wisdom when it comes to
sustainability. But we are past the talking stage and well into
the practice of making sustainability an integral part of everything
we do.
We decided in 2001 that environmental sustainability, social
responsibility and financial viability cannot be considered in
isolation but are, in fact, interdependent. We soon recognised that
to set sustainability benchmarks for our industry, we had to create
a culture of excellence in sustainable practice and integrate it into
all of our business decision-making processes.
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