Since announcing the NYK Group ESG Story in February 2021, the NYK Group has annually reported on its progress through an ESG Story. In November 2023, we released NYK Group ESG Story 2023, which summarizes our latest achievements, together with the NYK Group Decarbonization Story, which outlines our specific initiatives aimed at realizing a carbon-free society. NYK Group ESG Story 2023 also provides non-financial information not included in the medium-term management plan announced in March 2023.

In fiscal 2023, we formulated the NYK Group CX Story, which is a strategy for improving the professional skills of group colleagues even further. The Chief Human Resources Officer and other members of the Human Resources Team earnestly prepared concrete HR policies in line with my strong desire to encourage NYK Group colleagues all over the world to be more excited about their work. Of the Group's more than 35,000 employees, roughly 80% work outside Japan. Our strategy is to establish a vision of the human resources required for a truly global company and then develop the systems and career paths necessary to realize this vision. These efforts will be based on the concept of "a global company headquartered in Japan" rather than the approach of "a Japanese company operating globally."

The ESG Story and other stories result from thorough discussions focused on the NYK Group's three material issues—Safety, the Environment, and Human Resources—and have been incorporated into specific measures and plans. As we hold briefings at our operating bases around the world, the enthusiasm with which participants are commenting and asking questions is greater than ever before. For this reason, I feel that the type of ESG management that we initially sought is beginning to acquire its own momentum. Rather than taking measures based on a one-way process led by the head office, frontline employees are thinking and acting on their own initiative.

We are a corporate group engaged in a logistics business that is centered on the operation of ships. Because maritime shipping mainly uses heavy oil as fuel, large amounts of greenhouse gas are emitted. In other words, the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by the NYK Group is largely determined by the extent to which it can lower ship emissions. Furthermore, the Group cannot easily reduce emissions on its own because the logistics business is part of an industry that is closely integrated with an array of industries and supply chains.

The recently announced NYK Group ESG Story 2023 and the NYK Group Decarbonization Story set decarbonization targets that go even further than those announced in the medium-term management plan. First, we switched our base year comparison targets from efficiency targets to absolute corporate emissions targets to heighten awareness that the achievement of net-zero emissions by 2050 is imperative. We also aligned our targets with the more stringent 1.5℃ scenario of the Paris Agreement instead of its 2.0℃ scenario. This even stronger focus on net-zero emissions led us to set the extremely ambitious medium-term target of achieving a 45% reduction in absolute corporate emissions by fiscal 2030 compared with those of fiscal 2021. Moreover, our focus on net-zero emissions and commitment to new targets resulted in a shift in our overall approach. Rather than being solely based on the combined application of technologies that are currently available or that will become available in the near future, our setting of the 45% reduction target is also premised on doing everything we can to advance a wide range of initiatives. Specifically, we will encourage the acceleration of technology-related innovation and initiatives and promote co-creation with our stakeholders.
Our sense of mission stems from the knowledge that society as a whole cannot achieve carbon neutrality without decarbonizing the logistics business, on which global supply chains rely. We are determined to move forward with concerted Groupwide initiatives that reflect this mission and the belief that sincere efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions will drive our sustainable growth as a corporate group.

By continuing to actively disclose detailed information on measures and progress toward targets and by realizing higher-quality dialogues with all stakeholders, we will accelerate initiatives to decarbonize not only the NYK Group but also the maritime industry and society in general. As the Group redoubles its efforts, I would like to ask all our stakeholders for their continued support.