The Covid-19 pandemic has been a roller coaster ride for all people and businesses in the whole world, and Hong Kong is no exception. It is encouraging to see that Hong Kong is finally moving forward on the path to normalcy. The pandemic has caused disruption around the world, but it could also be an impetus for transformation and opportunities.
Facing the extraordinary challenges of COVID-19, our people have shown remarkable resilience and commitment, supporting each other to sustain our business continuity. We even supported the government by providing around the clock concrete and aggregates supply to support the speedy construction of the six urgent quarantine facilities during the most difficult time of COVID-19 fifth wave in 2022. We adapted to the situation and rose to the challenge. We are part of the Hong Kong community and we strive to provide our full support to Hong Kong. Big thanks to everyone in Alliance for their hard work and sacrifice to make it happen.
Alliance, since our predecessors, has grown hand in hand with the Hong Kong construction industry for over six decades. We pride ourselves as a total solutions provider of ready-mix concrete and aggregates to support our customers to meet any challenging construction requirements. We celebrated the commencement of our new STW2 mega concrete plant in November 2022. This STW2 plant, embracing the latest digital technologies and green features, synergizes with our STW1 and TTS plants and starts a New Chapter of our Tsing Yi Concrete Production Hub. We now have 3 plants with 8 production lines in this Hub forming a smart and highly capable concrete supply chain to support the mega construction projects of Hong Kong in coming years.
We have embarked on our journey of digitalization with our Tsing Yi Production Hub. We deploy AI video analytics to develop a smart control system to ensure the integrity and accuracy of our outbound concrete logistics. Our staff worked from home to carry out concrete batching remotely as a contingency measure during the fifth wave of COVID-19. We have enhanced the process and expanded the scope to implement remote batching for our 8 production lines of the Hub. This has significantly enhanced the reliability and resilience of our concrete production and outbound logistics.
Our e-docket is another important milestone in our journey of automation and digitalization. It is a breakthrough of industry practice and will drive the market trend towards digitalization. This powerful app will provide a seamless experience for our customers with foolproof and touchless goods receipt. It can help to ensure the logistics integrity that the right concrete load is delivered to the right site and to the right loading point. With this app, our customers will have the real-time information of concrete deliveries at the tips of their fingers to make informed decisions. We will continue to explore new technologies and innovative solutions to improve our operations and enhance our customer satisfaction.
Industry stakeholders shall take into account the impact they have on the world and the support to the society as a whole besides their profit margin. As the leader of the industry, we are committed to the highest standard of corporate governance, social responsibility, business ethics and integrity. At Alliance, we integrate ESG into the core of our strategies and operations, and it comes under 4 main aspects — contribution to a low carbon future, commitment to environmental excellence, care for our people and traceability in material sourcing and manufacturing.
We recognize the impact of climate change and the urgent need to reduce our carbon footprint. We have mapped out our sustainable development goals and action plans in “Alliance Sustainability Ambitions 2030” in 2018. I am proud to share with you the progress of our actions in the time of pandemic.
We have committed to the Science Based Targets initiative (“SBTi”) as a key step of climate protection ambition to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. We are on track to meet our targets by adopting sustainable practices in our operations.
We have introduced green logistics by adopting 5-axle concrete mixer trucks, which has increased the load size and allowed us to reduce the number of trips, thereby reducing our carbon footprint and also improving our operational efficiency.
We are implementing an ISO 50001 certified Efficient Energy Management System for all our concrete plants to continuously improve our energy performance. In addition, we have invested in solar panels at our Tsing Yi Production Hub to join the race to net-zero with renewable solar energy.
We have obtained the highest rankings of green product certification under CIC Green Product Certification Scheme for the products of our Green Concrete Solutions with adoption of quality Secondary Cementitious Materials (SCM) of PFA and GGBS.
Raw materials play a critical role in our concrete product quality. We have embedded transparency and traceability in our raw materials sourcing and manufacturing process to increase visibility, improve quality control, reduce product defects and foster a stronger partnership with our customers and suppliers.
We firmly believe that supply chain traceability and transparency will assure our compliance with regulations, reduce our environmental impact and support our performance with greater social responsibility.
For people, we place strong focus on the well-being of our employees and contract drivers, and on building relationships with the community. We realize the creation of harm-free workplaces and foster a positive work environment for shared purposes, values, and trust.
We strive to improve community engagement by establishing a community liaison group in Tsing Yi, where our concrete production hub is located, to listen to and address any concerns of stakeholders. We also continue our good neighbour practices and support underprivileged groups through various CSR projects. Our "Alliance Run for Hope" virtual charity run events in 2021 and 2022 have raised funds for Po Leung Kuk.
Next year we will be celebrating 20 years of excellence in supporting the city’s sustainable development. It marks an important milestone for Alliance as we look back on our growth, accomplishments and relationships built with our customers, community and all other stakeholders.
Alliance and our people have been evolving continually over the past two decades to stay passionate, innovative and competitive to grow our business in a sustainable way. We take pride in what we did and it harness our power moving forward. I would like to sincerely thank all our people for their hard work and persistence in achieving our goals.
We have embarked on a journey of transformation by embracing digitalization, automation and ESG initiatives. We are confident that our transformation today will help us to create a better tomorrow. By continuing to innovate and adapt, we can build a more resilient and sustainable business that will benefit all our stakeholders for years to come.
And last but not least, I would also like to extend my heartfelt gratitude to our shareholders for their unwavering support and belief in our vision. We will continue to work towards our sustainability goals and create a better tomorrow for our business, our people, and our community.
