Vodafone embarks on a paperless culture to reduce consumption

As part of its drive to cut down on paper, Vodafone has sent 11 tonnes worth of paper to be recycled, which results in saving about 187 trees from April 2010 till the present day. In order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that can contribute to climate change and to reduce the energy required to manufacture new paper products, Vodafone makes a special effort to ensure that all their waste paper is recycled. Recycling paper products saves considerable landfill space and reduces energy and water consumption.

Recycling also provides greater energy and a reduction of methane emissions caused when burning waste paper. Miriam Dalli, Corporate Affairs Senior Executive at Vodafone Malta said "In our quest to further help the environment we are living in, Vodafone Malta seperates all waste and recycle all paper, whilst making sure that all waste documentation is disposed of in a secure and eco-friendly manner."

Vodafone is instilling a paperless culture among its employees in order to avoid unnecessary printing. When Vodafone moves to its new offices in Skyparks, all printing will be centralized in two rooms per floor. Documents will only be printed if an employee physically goes to the printer with the identification card to print out the documents sent to be printed. Documents not printed within a specified time frame, will be deleted off the system.

Vodafone is also currently using an Electronic Document Management System, which helps to store, retrieve and share documents electronically and is also electronically archiving the documents that must be kept. These archived documents will then be shared primarily in electronic format. Vodafone is also encouraging employees to use tablets to further reduce the usage of paper.

"We are moving towards a paperless environment and the current initiatives are just a small part of the whole picture," said Antoinette Camilleri, Property Manager at Vodafone Malta. "Once we move to our new offices in Skyparks, we will be providing a detailed report of printing record per employee. The idea is to follow up these amounts with a percentage target reduction per team.We have also introduced changes in our culture and mentality and we're moving from a paper based structure to an electronic structure which makes use of the latest technology."