On October 5, 2013, during the 2013 Genoa Boat Show, the voluntary agreement was signed between the Ministry of Environment and the Tuscan luxury yacht builder, VSY, aboard the breath-taking Stella Maris yacht and in the presence of the Minister for the Environment, Andrea Orlando. The agreement was presented under the Ministry’s Carbon Footprint Programme.

FROM LEFT: VIENNA ELEUTERI, VSY SUSTAINABILITY MANAGER – CRISTIANA LONGARINI, VSY DIRECTOR – ANDREA ORLANDO, ITALIAN MINISTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT – LUCIANO SCARAMUCCIA, VSY DIRECTOR - Photo credit to Martino Motti

VSY have made sustainability the strength of their company policy. The commitment with the Ministry has as its objective “the promotion of joint projects aimed at the analysis, reduction and neutralization of the environmental impact in the yachting sector.”

The reduction of carbon emissions through the evaluation of the “carbon footprint” and the consequent adoption of mitigation measures is a programme that the Ministry of the Environment has been working on for some years and which has already involved 187 national companies from different sectors (food & agriculture, manufacturing, fashion, transportation and other services).

At the Boat Show in Genoa, during the meeting on board the M/Y “Stella Maris”, the program was explained by the General Director of the Ministry of the Environment Corrado Clini and by VSY Sustainability Manager Vienna Eleuteri. Other Italian entrepreneurs, who have made the choice of “sustainability” by signing the voluntary agreement with the Ministry, spoke about their green corporate governance and innovative business models.

Furthermore, the Italian carbon-footprint programme, which especially in food industry has also been enriched by the parameters of the water footprint to analyze water consumption, is becoming a benchmark in the European framework for environmental assessment.