Issue #1 - Where it all started

My name is Lucy Klinkenberg-Matthews and I’m the Head of Sustainability for Paragon Customer Communications. As such, I’m responsible for devising, implementing and delivering our Sustainability Ambition 2030.

Sustainability is part of my DNA. My dad worked in sustainability all his adult life (although it wasn’t called that back then!) He spent 17 years working in Northern Nigeria delivering soil mapping projects, where he met my mum who was doing VSO (Voluntary Services Overseas), and where I was born.

His work focused on irrigation, crop rotation, and land use projects across Africa and the Far East. While my sisters and I were young we accompanied him to wherever he was based, including Southern Sudan, Kenya and Tanzania. My mum will occasionally make comments about checking the toy box for scorpions every morning or dealing with three malaria-ridden children on a five-hour drive to the nearest hospital!

We settled in the UK once I reached school age and spent holiday periods visiting wherever dad was located. He worked in Ethiopia for around three years, and it is here that my clearest memories of the impacts of climate change, deforestation, social inequality, and political instability lie. Those experiences have stayed with me throughout my life.

?I initially joined Paragon as an environmental manager, looking after the environmental programmes at our Bristol site. Since then, I’ve seen the business grow rapidly from three or four production sites to the 20 we have now, and my role has evolved with it. This is an exciting time to be working in sustainability and I am passionate about leading PCC's programmes to embed these ideas across the lifecycle of our solutions, products and services.

The drive to a Net Zero economy and a fairer, more equitable society will take collaboration and hard work. It won’t be easy, but I am proud to be working together with our employees, clients and supply chain on that journey as part of our Planet, People, and Partners strategy.

Prior to lockdown, I worked with my daughter’s school to help achieve the United Nations Rights Respecting School Silver Award, and was thrilled when the school integrated the UN Sustainable Development Goals into their curriculum. These are simple ideas that our children can understand, and it was great to be inspiring the next generation of sustainability professionals!

Each month I’m going to be sharing a new story from our sustainability journey, so thank you for reading and I hope you enjoy them. And if you have any questions, please feel free to add them to the comments below.

Lucy