COLLEAGUES from VetPartners have shown their passion for looking after people and the planet as well as the patients in their care.
Team members from across our UK veterinary practices and animal healthcare companies, along with our central support team in York, joined forces to raise nearly £300,000 for charity and recycle 6.4 tonnes of waste during 2023.
The fundraising total was nearly double that of 2022, with £294,056 raised for 92 different charities, including VetPartners’ charity of the year, Gambia Horse and Donkey Trust, a small charity working to alleviate rural poverty and improve animal welfare in the West African country.
Colleagues have been running, walking, hiking, climbing and organising cake sales to raise funds for the small charity working to alleviate rural poverty and improve animal welfare in the West African country.
Quantock Vets clinical director Louise Ash, pictured left, was among our clinical team members who volunteered with Gambia Horse and Donkey Trust – an opportunity she described as the experience of a lifetime. She provided emergency care of animals and organised neutering clinics for stray dogs.
Veterinary practices across the UK are also continuing to recycle through TerraCycle, saving 6.4 tonnes of PPE, flexible plastics, pet food pouches and medication blister packs from landfill or incineration and instead turning them into recycled products.
VetPartners’ fundraising and sustainability efforts have been highlighted in our newly published 2023 Sustainability and Giving Back Report.
The report demonstrates further strides in our aim to put giving back and sustainability at the heart of our business.
It also highlights two key long-term sustainability projects to baseline our full carbon footprint and prepare to set net-zero targets, and review the environmental and social sustainability of its supply chain.
Other highlights of its 2023 Sustainability and Giving Back Report include:
- 381 acres of habitat are now protected through VetPartners’ partnership with World Land Trust.
- 93% of VetPartners’ UK sites are now on renewable electricity tariffs.
- 20% of VetPartners’ UK businesses are accredited or working towards Investors in the Environment (iiE) accreditation scheme through VetPartners’ corporate membership.
- 142 colleagues across the UK received training last year in how to make their practice more sustainable.
- VetPartners is reducing the use of anaesthetic greenhouse gases in practices, and 99% of practices now do not use nitrous oxide.
- For a second year, VetPartners matched the fundraising of colleagues for registered charities and offered employees an annual paid day off for volunteering.
The report’s author, VetPartners Head of ESG Dr Hannah James, explained how we have set more ambitious targets for sustainability and giving back as part of its overall strategy to expand the business in an ethical, sustainable and profitable way.
In December 2023, VetPartners appointed external consultants to help it calculate our baseline carbon emissions. Once there is a detailed understanding of the makeup of its carbon footprint later this year, the group will develop net-zero targets and – more importantly – the strategy that we’ll use to achieve them.
We have also developed a Supplier Code of Conduct, setting out the minimum environmental and social standards expected from the companies that supply the group with medicines, equipment and other business supplies. The move will help VetPartners to ensure its procurement activity is carried out responsibly, with the aim of minimising any negative environmental or social impacts, and promoting positive changes throughout the whole life cycle and supply chain.
Hannah, pictured here with our certificate from World Land Trust showing the number of acres protected thanks to VetPartners, said: “We have reviewed our progress against 21 targets we set in our first Sustainability and Giving Back strategy to see where we’re on track, where we could do better and where we’ve exceeded our ambitions.
“We’ve also reviewed the targets themselves to check they’re still relevant and helpful, and the results are all included in our latest report.”
VetPartners CEO Jo Malone said: “I am constantly inspired by the generosity and dedication of our colleagues, both in their work, and in their commitment to giving back to people, animals and the environment, whether locally or on a global scale.
“Our colleagues raised more than ever for their chosen charities in 2023, and often in ways that bring their teams together by organising fundraising events, taking on team challenges, or volunteering.
“That team spirit has also been demonstrated through the achievements of VetPartners businesses that have gained or maintained their iiE accreditation, given their time to energy audits, and formed green groups within their practices to work together on sustainability.”
For media enquiries, please contact Amanda Little, VetPartners PR and Communications Director at amanda.little@vetpartners.co.uk or 07970 198492
