OMDS and sustainability

I have already mentioned it several times. Most recently in November last year. The topic of sustainability. The brown cardboard box printed with environmentally friendly ink was sold to us as brutal progress and a sustainability report officer had now been appointed.

That’s marvellous.

They have obviously realised that they are overfulfilling their target.

That’s why they packed the 150-600 in a huge polystyrene block. The brown cardboard on the outside, of course. The carbon footprint of polystyrene isn’t bad at all, but unfortunately it’s hardly ever recycled and is therefore vastly inferior to cardboard, and as it only breaks down into pellets over time but doesn’t degrade, it causes an increase in microplastics.

But that is, of course, a bit of a curiosity. What I find more interesting is why OMDS has appointed a sustainability officer – almost three years after I asked for information.

The reason is simple: the CRSD. The EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive, which came into force at the beginning of last year. Companies above a certain size have to prepare a fairly comprehensive sustainability report. The larger the company, the earlier. And since OMDS GmbH is a pan-European group with several hundred employees and a balance sheet total of over 80 million euros, a “large corporation”, they have to prepare such a report.

No, it’s not that anyone at OMDS cares about the environment or climate protection – they only fulfil the absolute minimum standards that they are forced to or that are subsidised by the state. (They subsidise electric company cars. Sure – they are far more favourable for the company in terms of tax).

OMDS claims to be interested in nature – but only as an advertising backdrop for its cameras. Sustainability, environmental protection and climate protection are not on the agenda. Instead of repairing old devices (which is a good way to make money), customers are encouraged to dispose of the old stuff and buy new. (This is not to say that repairs don’t work in Portugal. It has been working recently – and quite well. Including tracking).

Other manufacturers, such as Nikon, deliver extensive firmware updates with new functions, OMDS advertises this, but does not deliver. And not even OMDS dares to call what is announced extensive.

OMDS simply claims “Our employees are working from home, so we save a lot of CO2”. Above all, this saves them having to think about environmentally friendly office technology. Because lo and behold – suddenly the employees are in charge of how to keep their workplace warm in an environmentally friendly way, which furniture they use and which lamps. We are back in the feudal Middle Ages, where peasant women wove at home and the “Verleger” came round and took the fabrics away. (This was called the “Verlagssystem”) A big advantage for the “Verleger”: as the workers didn’t know each other, they couldn’t organise themselves, so he could play them all off against each other.