It is my pleasure to provide you with an update on Vicinity Centres’ (Vicinity) Sustainability journey through Vicinity Unwrapped – Our Sustainability Story.

FY20 has been an extraordinary year, not just in Australia but globally, with the challenges of COVID-19 testing our collective resilience. Vicinity’s primary focus during this time has been to ensure the health, safety and wellbeing of our employees, customers, tenants, contractors and broader communities.

As one of Australia’s leading retail property groups, with 400 million shoppers visiting our centres annually, we recognise the critical role our centres have played in their local communities at this time and take this responsibility seriously.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, our centres have remained open for our communities to access the essential goods and services they need.

Throughout the year, we have continued to bring our purpose of Enriching Community Experiences to life, and through our sustainability strategy, progress our work to create sustainable and resilient destinations and shape better communities.

We completed the third year of our national partnership with Beacon Foundation, through which we deliver our community investment program to alleviate youth unemployment and disengagement in our communities. Through an independent social return on investment analysis of our partnership, we found that for every $1 Vicinity has invested in Beacon’s programs since January 2017, there has been a positive ongoing economic benefit to the community of more than $22 each year. This is an exceptional outcome for the young people participating and for society more broadly.

Vicinity also implemented a wide range of initiatives in early 2020 to support bushfire-affected communities, with our overall contribution valued at more than $730,000.

We are tracking well towards our Net Zero by 2030 carbon target, having reduced our energy intensity by 20% from our baseline*, and by continuing to progress our on-site solar program across our wholly-owned retail assets.

Our industry-leading solar program now includes 25.2 MW of solar installed across our managed portfolio, with seven centres added during the year. We now have 17 centres with solar installed.

Vicinity continues to be recognised as one of the most sustainable retail REITs globally. In January 2020, Vicinity was included in CDP’s 2019 Climate A-List**, which recognises leading action on climate change. Vicinity was one of a small number of companies globally, and one of only four listed companies in Australia, to achieve this ranking.

We continue to approach sustainability as a collaborative effort, working with all of our stakeholders to deliver on our sustainability objectives. On behalf of the Board, I would like to extend my thanks to everyone involved for their passion and commitment to continue making Vicinity stronger and more sustainable each year. 

Trevor Gerber                                                                        Chairman

*Across wholly-owned retail assets, for 12 months to 29 February 2020 (excluding COVID-19 impacted performance period from 1 March 2020), compared to June 2016 baseline.

**CDP is a global not for profit organisation operating in 90 countries. In 2019, there were over 8000 companies analysed with the A-List comprised of only 182 of those.

As the CEO and Managing Director, and Chair of Vicinity’s Sustainability Committee, I am delighted to report to you Vicinity’s Sustainability approach and performance to the end of FY20.

Our highest priority during these challenging times with the evolving COVID-19 situation, is a heightened focus on the health, safety and wellbeing of everyone who works in or visits our centres, our broader team and our communities. We have been extremely proud of the agile approach taken by our centre teams in response to this. They have worked tirelessly to keep our centres open to ensure that our customers can continue to access essential goods and services safely, and our retailers can continue to operate their businesses safely.

During the year, we continued to improve the environmental efficiency across the portfolio. We achieved a 12% reduction in energy intensity and a 17% reduction in carbon intensity, compared to our prior year performance.*

We remain on target to meet our interim objectives towards our Net Zero by 2030 carbon target**. Our industry-leading solar program progressed, with solar installations completed at Castle Plaza, Elizabeth City Centre, Altona Gate, Victoria Gardens, DFO Homebush, Ellenbrook Central and Livingston Marketplace during the year.

In FY20, we completed a comprehensive review of our procurement processes to understand how environmental, social and governance (ESG) considerations could be more deeply embedded. Based on this, we have a clear action plan aiming to reduce ESG risk in our supply chain, with a focus on modern slavery. We also continue to support social enterprises and Indigenous businesses, via procurement agreements which help to provide training, skills and employment opportunities to disadvantaged members in our communities.

* Across comparable portfolio. Energy and carbon intensity reductions were 4% and 8% respectively for non COVID-19 impacted performance period (12 months to 29 February 2020), surpassing FY20 targeted 3% reduction for both energy and carbon intensity

** For our wholly-owned retail assets. Consistent with global carbon measurement standards, this applies to common mall areas.

I am especially proud of our commitment to reconciliation, this year progressing our commitments to the Indigenous community under our Innovate Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP) which aims to increase respect, equality and opportunity for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, businesses and communities.

In FY20, we continued progressing our program of work to create a high-performance culture at Vicinity. Insights from over 300 team members, coupled with insights from our employee engagement, risk and diversity surveys, have provided the foundation for our work on driving a high-performance culture at Vicinity, which will continue into FY21.

We have made significant achievements in our sustainability journey this year and I look forward to sharing Vicinity’s ongoing progress as we continue to lead in Sustainability.

Grant Kelley                                                                        CEO and Managing Director

Vicinity Unwrapped is Vicinity Centres’ (Vicinity or the Group) key platform for disclosing our environmental, social, governance and long-term economic information and performance.

The information within this site should be read in conjunction with our 2020 Annual (Integrated) Report and 2020 Corporate Governance Statement, available through our Investor Centre.

The content on this site has been prepared in accordance with the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) Standard at a core level.  The report discloses our performance and management of issues that are material to our business and our key stakeholders. The GRI Content Index can be downloaded here.  

Information on this site covers all retail assets under our operational control (direct and managed portfolio) as well as the corporate offices we occupy to run our business. Refer to our 2020 Sustainability Reporting Criteria for further information on our reporting scopes and boundaries. All performance data contained within this site is based on the financial year, the 12 months ending 30 June 2020 (FY20), or as at 30 June 2020, unless otherwise stated. Our performance is updated annually. The FY20 Sustainability Performance Pack can be downloaded here. 

A number of our environmental and social disclosures are externally assured by KPMG. The External Assurance Statement can be viewed here.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are warned photographs in this website may contain images of deceased persons which may cause sadness or distress.  

Your feedback is important to us. You can contact us or provide any comments you have via sustainability@vicinity.com.au.

*For Vicinity’s wholly owned retail assets

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