SA food industry to pilot Siemens emissions tracking solution

Siemens, in association with Food South Australia (Food SA), is looking for a South Australian food and beverage company to be the nation’s first to trial SiGreen, a Siemens tool designed to enable companies to track and manage verifiable Product Carbon Footprints (PCF) across their supply chain while each company maintains full data sovereignty.

South Australian Deputy Premier Dr Susan Close welcomed the pilot program.

“South Australian businesses know that we need to reduce carbon emissions, but can find the process of tracking their emissions to be daunting,” she said. “Supporting our strong-performing food manufacturing sector to identify, track and reduce their carbon footprint will be critical to South Australia’s future economic and environmental sustainability.”

“Most companies don’t realise this, but a commitment to net zero means a commitment to measure, track and reduce your emissions in your direct supply chain — otherwise known as scope 3 emissions,” said Siemens Australia and New Zealand CEO Peter Halliday. “Put simply, our industries need to accelerate their efforts and capabilities around net zero or they risk being locked out of critical local and global supply chains.”

The chosen company will have an opportunity to engage with their supply chain on a product level and quantify the CO₂ contribution of individual components and suppliers, enabling a cross-company effort towards decarbonisation and net zero targets.

Siemens said that through SiGreen, the company will benefit from replacing highly manual processes, exchange emission data along the supply chain, and combine it with data from the company’s own value creation to obtain a product’s true carbon footprint.

The pilot will be facilitated by Food SA, the state’s peak industry body for the sector. Catherine Sayer, Food SA CEO, welcomed the initiative, saying it would play a pivotal role in shaping the discussions around net zero in the industry.

“One of the recommendations from the South Australia Food and Beverage 5-year Export Strategy was to implement a recognised food and beverage environmental sustainability accreditation system,” she said. “We know our industry needs to understand and be ready to meet the global demands of environmental sustainability and we’re pleased that Siemens has chosen South Australia to pilot this important technology.

“This pilot will not only give a company the opportunity to obtain a product’s true carbon footprint in each manufacturing process and support companies in tracking their product carbon footprint but also help validate current and future emissions against their set goals. The F&B sector in South Australia is worth over $11 billion — and we are working towards getting the right systems in place to make it more sustainable for future generations.”

The first step for interested companies is to register to participate at Food SA’s special industry briefing on 4 May 2023. Registrations can be made by clicking here.

Image caption: Dr Susan Close and Peter Halliday.