In this guest article, Christina Mayer, Team Lead CSR at the German Bundesliga club FSV Mainz 05, gives insights into the club’s actions for climate protection.
Sustainability is a main part of the statute, of the mission statement, and of the strategy of Mainz 05. In 2010, our club became climate-neutral as the beginning of many other measures and projects to help save the environment which have followed. Our carbon footprint is the basis for our measures to become as climate-friendly as possible.
As part of “05ER Klimaverteidiger”, we want to inform our stakeholders about the consequences of the climate crisis to create an informative basis to base their future actions on.
This involves for example projects for students, such as the “Young Climathon 2022“ or the “05ER Klimaverteidiger-Schule“. These projects aim to inform children and adolescents about the climate crisis, but they also want to give them the opportunity to be part of the change and bring in their knowledge and ideas to help create a better future.
Fans are another target group for our engagement. The mobility of our fans in connection with matchdays causes the most greenhouse gas emissions. To reduce them we have to set incentives to have an impact on behaviour according to mobility. Through incentives we also have the opportunity to promote climate-friendly actions, such as buying sustainable products, eat less meat etc. Examples are free tickets for the public transportation or free bike repairs at the stadium to motivate change in travelling routines. In our food stalls and fanshops we promote climate-friendly options, such as offering sustainable products and meat-free meal alternatives or regional foods.
In order to further highlight the importance of climate-friendly actions, we planned the “05ER Klimaverteidiger-Woche“ during which we wanted to use one week to inform and set incentives through different ways. During this week we wanted to inform on our channels about our engagement, several informative events during the week, and possibilities to act climate-friendly. At the highlight event of the week, the „05ER Klimaverteidiger-Konferenz“, renowned experts discussed climate targets and the possible impact of the economy to reach them. Dr. Jörg Kukies (Secretary of State at the Federal Chancellery, head of the departments of European Politics, Finance, and Economy), Dr. Melanie Maas-Brunner (Member of the Board of Executive Director BASF SE), Dr. Ralph Solveen (Deputy head of Economic Research at the Commerzbank AG), and Katharina Balcet (Embassador of Plant-for-the-Planet) were part of the discussion and shared their opinions.
Due to the rescheduling of the match against Borussia Dortmund, the “05ER Klimaverteidiger-Woche“ was extended to March 16th 2022, which marked the “05ER Klimaverteidiger-Spieltag“. On this matchday, Mainz 05 wanted to build more awareness by highlighting information on climate protection in many areas. In addition to that, Mainz 05 encouraged the fans to engage in climate protection by buying a ticket, as 1 Euro per ticket price is donated to climate projects. Mainz 05 also used its club media channels to show the fans how to help be more climate-friendly during the matchdays. Mainz 05 was supported by the “05ER Klimaverteidiger-Partners“ – a network of businesses which aims to connect each other to develop and implement new ideas in the area of climate protection, but also intends to invest in regional climate projects. The partners are BITO Lagertechnik, Commerzbank AG, ENTEGA NATURpur Institut gGmbH, HAHN Kunststoffe GmbH, KYOCERA Document Solutions Deutschland GmbH, KÖMMERLING, and MEWA Textilservice AG Co Management OHG.
The network is part of the idea to implement value partnerships which connect with the values of Mainz 05.
These projects and campaigns are a small part of our engagement which addresses climate protection. Any such measures are furthermore part of our corporate social responsibility strategy. The strategy is a result of a goal-setting process which took place from 2018 to 2021 and involved different stakeholders, especially employees. For the next years we would like to further develop sustainability and the ecologic engagement to become as climate-friendly as possible. The process will also be characterized by the engagement of Deutsche Fußball Liga to change the licensing system by making sustainability part of it.
