By fiscal 2011, the year ending February 28, 2011, Circle K Sunkus aims to reduce the total weight of shopping bags used per store by 35% compared with the fiscal 2001 level, in partnership with various members of the Japan Franchise Association. Ongoing efforts are under way to achieve this goal. Besides trimming excess material from plastic shopping bags to make them smaller and lighter, we have requested the cooperation of customers at stores and distributed reusable shopping bags to them at no charge. These efforts are starting to produce steady results.
Furthermore, new store uniforms were introduced in fiscal 2009, the year ended February 29, 2009. Circle K Sunkus recycled its old uniforms into original reusable shopping bags. In fiscal 2010, we distributed these shopping bags to customers.
Please follow the link for further details on recycled uniforms.
Circle K Sunkus is working to use resources effectively by reducing and thoroughly sorting waste. The Company also aims to minimize the generation of waste in the first place and to promote recycling in partnership with not only Head Office and stores, but also government agencies and recycling companies.
Since fiscal 2009, Circle K Sunkus has worked to make more effective use of food waste by supporting a "recycling loop" at the UNY Group, which involves growing and selling vegetables using compost made partly from food waste generated at UNY Group stores. This initiative builds on Circle K Sunkus experience in converting food waste into compost and in various other environmental initiatives. We will also actively pursue the development of locally produced, locally consumed products.
The new store uniforms introduced in June 2008 are produced, as with our previous uniforms, from fabrics made of 100% recycled fiber from PET bottles. We recycled our old uniforms that were no longer needed first into fiber and then used this fiber to produce approximately 270,000 original reusable shopping bags. We distributed these shopping bags to customers at no chrage in May 2010. This marked the first time in the convenience store industry that an operator had not just recycled uniforms, but also converted them into reusable shopping bags for the benefit of customers.
