5. Strategy: results achieved

Royal Avebe sets a strategy once every five years and once a year it is evaluated. Avebe is now one year into its Accelerate and Strengthen strategy. A good time to get an interim update from Marleen de Rond-Schouten and Erik Elderman. 

"For Avebe, it is essential to keep starch potatoes relevant in our members' cropping plans. That's why our members' earnings model is central," Marleen begins to explain. Erik complements her: "We create that extra value by strengthening the portfolio and looking more closely at market needs. From that strengthened base, we can accelerate on plant-based starches and proteins, biobased ingredients, sustainability in the factory and in the field." "The way Avebe is now responding to all the external changes confirms the relevance of the strategy," Marleen adds. 

"Our employees are our most important assets," Marleen continues. "To accelerate, we require ownership and agility from our employees." Erik continues, "We need leaders who dare to make choices, because with choices you bring focus. We work with an annual operating plan, an annual plan in which we determine the main focus areas for the coming year from the strategy and carry them through to the organisation. Thanks to the leadership program, our leaders together with the team are able to implement the specific contribution of teams and individual objectives based on the Avebe annual plan. We record this in the HR interview cycle. With the cross-discipline objectives, we work more together, more as one entity with one interest. As one Avebe." 

When Marleen and Erik look back at last year, Marleen starts by listing what went well: "We have made our product portfolio less complex so that we are more competitive. What also went well, but takes a lot of time, are the development processes with customers to get our ingredients into customer recipes. Our application knowledge is our strength here. What we are also proud of is setting up the innovation portfolio for industrial products. At the Foxhol production site, we are showing agility resulting in more focus on added value within our modified starch portfolio for industrial applications." 

Marleen says starch potato cultivation is declining across Europe: "This is due to climate change, changing laws and regulations, rising cultivation costs and competition in the field. It is vital that the price we pay our farmer members is good and shows an upward trend. Erik therefore appeals: "To ensure additional added value, we need to operate even more from our core values: working together, taking responsibility and developing." Marleen adds: "We have made this concrete by encouraging and securing the Play to Win competences we like to see in the organisation: reflect, innovate, change, realise and connect."  

The assignment is 30 per cent CO₂ reduction within the procurement package, before 2030. Leonard de Weijs' Procurement department is tackling that assignment with both hands. "I think the most important thing is that we started this project in scope 3^*," says Leonard. "As an organisation, we can also say: we will wait, because sustainability does not necessarily generate money tomorrow. But we are starting and it is already yielding savings." Leonard lists that projects are under way on chemicals and transport and that eight sub-programs have been launched to reduce, reuse or recycle packaging. A basic limit on emissions has also been set from this year and sustainability criteria weigh more heavily in procurement processes than before. Leonard sums it up like this: "Sustainability is no longer an option, but a requirement. And I am proud of that."

"For the procurement of one of our chemicals, we switched suppliers based on financial conditions and ecological footprint. In doing so, we achieved a reduction of 4,000 tonnes of CO₂." 

The CO₂ reduction is most important to us, but sustainable procurement is more than that. Taking social responsibility is also part of it. It is often about things that feel more distant. How does the supplier treat people, for example. Is there no exploitation? Doesn't the sourcing of our raw materials cause forests to be cut down? For example, we have changed the recipe of one product, so that we virtually no longer source palm oil, and what we still buy is certified, of course.’ 

Royal Avebe's water use has been significantly reduced in recent years. "We have partly achieved this through reuse," explains Kees Maarschalk: "We use the same water in more process steps. The advantage is clear. We draw in less surface water and we also discharge less. A disadvantage, however, is that salts from the processes end up in less and less discharge water. Because of these higher salt concentrations, we are running into the limits of reuse. So we are facing the next step." 

"And the source in this case is a bit different from the water source," say Kees and Jacob. "Starting at the source means adding or allowing fewer salts to be created in the production process," Kees explains. "Less salt is only achievable by balancing many variables. We find that balance by better measuring and monitoring all those variables." Jacob concludes, "Measuring is knowing, is controlling. With this, we will make important steps with the teams within Avebe in the coming years." 

"I am most proud of the steps we have taken to monitor data-driven our sustainability targets. This helps customers in their approach to the market to calculate the total emissions in the product's production chain. In this, Avebe is leading the way," says Goos Wierbos. "Of course, as a commercial department, we steer primarily on margins and customer satisfaction. Also, more and more customers are focusing on CO₂ footprint." 

Many customers want to communicate transparently to consumers, for example about water consumption or CO₂ emissions throughout the production chain. One such customer is Griffith Foods Europe. Griffith Foods is a global product development partner specialising in food ingredients, from spices and sauces to spreads, coatings, flavourings, bakery products and more. They rewarded Avebe with an Environment Award. Their motivation: "“You have been a key supplier to us for many years. On top of this Avebe is at the forefront of sustainability and innovation which are in alignment with our aspirations and priorities.” 

Goos was honoured to receive this award: "Yes, definitely tastes like more," he laughs. "Our gold medal status from EcoVadis forms the basis of this award. During the presentation, I was also able to explain that with our sustainability programs we make the entire chain more sustainable. For example, we reduce our customers' scope 3^* CO₂ emissions by reducing cultivation impact and lowering water use and CO₂ emissions in our production." 

"A healthy product portfolio means a production line with a responsible footprint that answers our customers' demands," says Bas Gerrits. He says a long-sustainable portfolio ensures a good income for farmer members as well as employees, all with a responsible footprint. "In doing so, it is nice if we also balance within the portfolio both food and industrial products, to remain agile in production and towards the market." 

Last year, value was added by scrapping the least profitable products. In order to create room for growth in the highest-yielding products. "This period, we also had the challenge that not all production lines were full. Therefore, we switched quickly and deployed production lines differently. I think the flexibility to switch quickly is one of our strongest qualities." 

"Our portfolio for plant-based alternatives is also constantly expanding. Think, for example, of applications in plant-based cheese, dairy and meat and fish substitutes." 

Royal Avebe has been working as one team, or one Avebe, with the core values of cooperation, responsibility and development for some time. But the world is changing rapidly, so it is important to align and develop our leadership in parallel with these core values. Therefore, Avebe is working hard on leadership development and the development of our five Play to Win core competences for all Avebe employees. Natasja Turksma and Elke Deinum explain: "In addition to substantive knowledge, it is increasingly important that our leaders also pay attention to their leadership style and associated behaviours," Natasja explains. 

"With our team, we get to build on and facilitate the development of the desired behaviour. In which we try to go deeper with the leadership program, among other things," Elke says. She emphasises that everyone who participates in the program should think afterwards: "Change starts with me as a leader. I will start the conversation and also take responsibility for my own behaviour." 

According to Elke and Natasja, authentic leadership is also: "Listening well, making yourself vulnerable, letting yourself feel the discomfort, getting to know yourself and getting to know each other. Good leadership affects the dynamics within teams, between teams and thus in the entire organisation." Natasja and Elke flawlessly complement each other's sentences: "Leaders have the responsibility to connect and engage everyone in the team based on individual strengths and talents," they tell us passionately. 

"More efficient in the future and less manual work. That is the common thread in everything we do," says Erik Dijck in the interview together with Gijs Bleeker. "For the last few years, we have been building our own applications to make the work processes within Avebe more efficient. By now, 21 of them are live," Erik continues. Gijs sums it up this way: "With low-code software, we build better and faster. Two great tools were delivered this year in this way." 

"The great thing is that we developed this Pricing companion application ourselves," Erik explains. "This application helps Avebe have a unified and centrally coordinated pricing strategy. Based on all kinds of characteristics, account managers receive a price recommendation. It also enables us to respond faster to changes in the market." To that, Gijs concludes, "We can now differentiate much better on value for the customer." 

AgroInsight was also developed in-house. This application provides insight into Avebe's entire agro-process: from shares, contracts and crop inventory to transport and delivery planning and invoicing. Erik says a huge efficiency gain has been made: "The application offers many more functionalities. For instance, the supply planning is now generated automatically. This was previously done in Excel. The Agro department is also more agile and self-reliant and thus ready for the future." Gijs shares the future vision: "AgroInsight provides a good basis for the portal and the Avebe app used by our farmer members. We will continue to develop the portal and app in the coming years, and we expect this to contribute in further strengthening the relationship with our growers." 

Harm says he sees a lot of potential in the potato variety Avamond: "This variety can produce a lot of kilograms." Hendrik-Jan Schepel of Averis complements him: "Testing with the variety value group, a kind of study group with different growers, shows that this crop produces insufficient starch only if too much nitrogen is applied." This outcome is positive, he continues, "By testing varieties, growers will soon get specific information per variety. This will allow them to adjust the cultivation plan and maximise returns. If varieties are given specific cultivation measures, for example in terms of seed potato pre-treatment, fertilisation and storage, the starch yield per hectare can go up." 

Reinier Fluks is one of those growers affiliated in the variety value group: "First of all, I want to learn something, as potatoes are a big part of my acreage. In addition, I enjoy sharing and testing knowledge." Reinier explains that the growers are spread throughout Avebe's area, so that promising varieties can also be tested in practice on a larger scale.