Protecting and restoring nature for a healthier future
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Nature is essential for the health of people and the planet: it provides us with clean air, water, food, a stable climate and source products to make medicines. However, nature and biodiversity loss are putting human and planetary health at risk. Urgent action is needed to protect and restore the ecosystems and natural resources that communities, economies and society at large rely on.
Taking action on nature for a more sustainable future
Grounded in science, our approach to nature follows internationally recognised best practices for measuring, managing and disclosing our environmental impact, including the Conservation Hierarchy and tools from the Science-Based Targets Network (SBTN).
Our early adoption of the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) in 2024, and publication of our TNFD report in 2025 played a key role in helping us to identify our most significant connections to nature, strengthening our nature-related decision-making.
Collaboration is critical to halting and reversing nature loss, which is why we partnered with the World Business Council on Sustainable Development (WBCSD) and industry peers to develop a Roadmap to Nature Positive: Foundations for the Pharmaceutical Sector. This roadmap identifies key impacts, dependencies and priority actions we can take to drive positive impact across the sector.
Our key targets
50%
Water stewardship
Sustainable resource use and sourcing
We recognise that our operations rely on natural resources and we aim to minimise our usage of and impacts on nature wherever possible.
In 2025, we achieved a 23% reduction in water withdrawal compared to our 2015 baseline.
We are working to address our sector’s dependency on horseshoe crab blood, which is currently a regulatory requirement for Bacterial Endotoxin Testing to ensure our medicines are safe for patient use. Our aim is to transition to more efficient and sustainable testing methods that require less reagent while we work in parallel to shift to synthetic alternatives.
Sustainable sourcing of raw materials is also critical, as is collaborating with suppliers to improve environmental performance and promote the highest ethical and environmental standards.
Pollution minimisation
We aim to minimise environmental pollution right from R&D to manufacturing, and from patient use to disposal of our medicines.
The approach we take to pharmaceuticals in the environment (PIE) is central to mitigating the risk of our products adversely impacting water quality and ecosystems. We run a safe active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) discharge programme which applies to both our manufacturing sites and our suppliers, while our industry-leading EcoPharmacoVigilance (EPV) dashboard enables users to visualise the relative risks of our APIs that are found in the environment.
As the industry lead for the PREMIER project (Prioritisation and Risk Evaluation of Medicines in the EnviRonment), we are collaborating with peers to contribute to greener medicine design.
Taking measures to enable greater circularity and reduce waste is another way in which we’re reducing our environmental impact. We have reduced waste by 23% since 2015 and we’re focused on circular business approaches, including for plastics which are used widely in the development and production of medicines.
Nature restoration
Working in collaboration with stakeholders and through our Climate Adaptation and Nature Fund, we’re investing in nature and water stewardship projects across our value chain.
For example, in the US, we’re working with the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) to restore crucial beach habitats for horseshoe crabs, red knots and other shorebirds in the Delaware watershed.
In Spain, we are funding a wetland project in Barcelona to improve water quality in an area heavily affected by treated wastewater, aiming to also advance research in biopurification.
Through our global reforestation and biodiversity programme AZ Forest, we're collaborating with planting experts on natural forest restoration and agroforestry to support climate action, increase species diversity, promote sustainable livelihoods, and provide nutrition for local communities. Since 2020, we have planted over 66 million trees.
Our local Biodiversity Action Plans aim to conserve nature around our R&D and medicines manufacturing sites.
Our nature action is underpinned by our circular economy approach and our ongoing water stewardship journey.
By embedding sustainability across our business – from lab to patient – and working in partnership we are contributing to the protection and restoration of nature which is vital for a healthy future.