Sustainability and resilience are core business
issues in the life sciences sector, given the
sector's central role in addressing systemic global
challenges including pandemics, access to medicine,
and fundamental human rights.
Although the specific factors from a sustainability
perspective in the life science industry differ from
those of other industries, creating new and
sustainable value in the life science space will
depend upon how companies address relevant
sustainability risks.
Boards must actively identify such sustainability
risks and ensure that they are efficiently mitigated
in order for their companies to avoid pitfalls and
ensure compliance with evolving regulation around
the globe and also to maintain their competitive
the globe – and also to maintain their competitive
position and profitability.
On the basis of our experience in the sector, we
believe the following sustainability-related themes
to be the core sustainability issues that will
continue to affect life science businesses:
Access and affordability: Access and affordability: Addressing unmet healthcare needs, increasing
access to affordable essential medicines and
strengthening health systems around the world are
all fundamental to social and economic progress. The
coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has further
highlighted the importance of the life sciences
sector in addressing these challenges. Against this
background, international life science business will
need to engage in discussions about and develop
strategies addressing these issues across the world,
particularly with regard to improving the situation
in lesser developed countries.
Supply chain compliance: Many
>Supply chain compliance: Many
governments and regulators around the world are
implementing tighter rules on supply chain
compliance. To retain their license to operate, life
sciences companies must adhere to an evolving set of
global laws and regulations. Furthermore,
transparency requirements, as well as responsibility
and liability for global suppliers are increasing.
This ongoing regulatory shift, and the increased
likelihood of litigation which goes with it, will
have a significant impact on the global life
sciences industry. This is because supply chains are
often particularly lengthy and complex and
influenced by many different internal and external
factors that are hard to monitor and control.
Product safety and quality: Fake
>Product safety and quality: Fake
or substandard medicines lead to hundreds of
thousands of deaths each year. Drug safety, along
with protecting health consumers from counterfeit
medicines and drug diversion, are integral to
ensuring public health and maintaining trust and
confidence in the life sciences sector.
Consequently, life science companies will need to
put increasing focus on ensuring product safety as
well as maintaining secure distribution channels to
patients.
Business ethics: There is
>Business ethics: There is
increasing stakeholder attention, including from
regulators and policymakers and also from providers
of capital, on transparency and ethics in business
dealings with healthcare providers and medical
practitioners for the sale and use of products, as
well as in relation to lobbying and advocacy
activities. The way in which businesses respond to
these expectations can have a direct impact upon
their reputation, their cost of capital and
ultimately upon their license to operate.
Transparency and access in clinical
trials: Stakeholders increasingly expect transparency in
clinical trials and wider access to trial data for
scientific exchange and research. There is a bright
spotlight on participant safety and privacy.
Businesses are demanding more effective information
sharing to enable informed decision-making and
consent, along with post-trial access to results.
Technology and collaborative partnerships with
patient and health worker groups enable wider
representative demographic populations to
participate in clinical trials.
Sustainable sourcing, product lifecycles and a
circular economy: Markets demand greater visibility across product
lifecycles, businesses make commitments to net-zero
decarbonisation and business model innovation is
driven by circular economy concepts. Underpinned by
an increasingly complex transnational regulatory
landscape, these developments are changing the way
raw materials are sourced; how products are
designed, manufactured, packaged, sold, reused or
recycled; how waste and hazardous material is
treated; and how wider environmental and social
impacts relating to issues like emissions, plastics,
water use, biodiversity loss, labour conditions and
community impacts are managed.
Net-zero decarbonisation and optimisation of
processes: In striving to decarbonise the economy, businesses
are implementing commitments to Science Based
Targets, increasing energy efficiency and reducing
carbon output, decreasing dependency on fossil fuels
and increasing the use of renewables. The
implementation of these initiatives is creating
operational efficiencies, optimising the drug
manufacturing, packaging and distribution process
and reducing costs across the sector.
Find out more about sustainability at DLA
Piper
