The Emirates Group has been recognised for the second time with the UAE’s highest accolade in sustainable business impact, the Platinum Impact Seal Award for 2025-2027 from the UAE National CSR Fund, Majra.
The award was presented by His Excellency Abdullah bin Touq Al Marri, Minister of Economy and Tourism and Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Majra, to Emirates’ Deputy President and Chief Operations Officer, Adel Al Redha, under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Vice President, Deputy Prime Minister and Chairman of the Presidential Court.
The Impact Seal – Platinum Tier is the UAE’s highest federal recognition for organisations that have demonstrated outstanding performance and measurable impact across environmental, social and governance (ESG) practices. It follows a comprehensive assessment against Majra’s evaluation metrics, spanning an organisation’s CSR initiatives, sustainability practices, governance, and overall impact, alongside its alignment with the UN Sustainable Development Goals and UAE national priorities.
Adel Al Redha said: "The Emirates Group is proud to be recognised with the Platinum Impact Seal for the second consecutive cycle, and this award reaffirms and demonstrates our continued commitment to advancing sustainability and introducing innovative practices across our businesses. We recognise our responsibility to support and participate in solutions that contribute to the aviation’s environmental challenges, therefore we continue to focus on making progress and taking an active role where we can have a positive outcome: through practical environmental practices and projects, support for our communities, sound governance, and partnerships across our ecosystem aimed at practical solutions, in line with the UAE’s national priorities."
The Emirates Group’s Environmental Sustainability Framework is built on three pillars: reducing emissions, consuming responsibly, and preserving wildlife and habitats. Across these pillars, the Group strives to deliver value to people, communities and economies while aiming to continuously improve its environmental performance. Some initiatives over the last year include:
- Green Ops: The airline continues implementing its operational fuel efficiency programme, first established in 2016, to reduce fuel consumption and emissions through pilot training, data analytics, optimised flight routings, reducing engine taxiing, among others. In 2024–25, these initiatives saved over 98,000 tonnes of fuel and cut carbon emissions by more than 312,000 tonnes while maintaining safety.
- Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF): In 2025-2026, Emirates procured over 28,000 tonnes of SAF, leading to further reduction in emissions by more than 93,000 tonnes. The airline also signed an MoU with ENOC Group to explore and develop joint initiatives for the supply of Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) to Emirates at its Dubai hub.
- Upcycling materials from the world’s largest retrofit programme: Fabrics and parts salvaged from the airline’s retrofit programme have been upcycled into limited-edition luggage pieces, with proceeds supporting the Emirates Airline Foundation. In 2025, the airline launched the Aircrafted KIDS programme and has so far donated around 4,000 upcycled school bags to children’s organisations across Africa, Asia and the Middle East.
- Repurposing plastic: The airline continued its closed-loop recycling initiative for inflight meal service items, which have so far repurposed over 88,000 kilograms of damaged or unserviceable items into new products for use onboard.
- Clean energy: In October 2024, Emirates partnered with Etihad Clean Energy Development to install nearly 40,000 solar panels at Emirates Engineering Centre, supplying 37% of the facility’s energy and reducing annual CO₂e emissions by over 13,000 tonnes.
- Emirates Flight Catering (EKFC) biodigester: EKFC, the world’s largest flight catering facility, commissioned a large-scale, custom-built biodigester to enable on-site processing of organic waste. At full capacity, the biodigester is estimated to avoid more than 2,000 tonnes of carbon emissions annually.
- Fleet transformation: dnata is steadily replacing diesel-powered ground support equipment with hybrid, electric and, in the future, hydrogen-powered alternatives. As a result of its investments in recent years, more than 17% of its global fleet is now electrified.
- Alternative fuel adoption: dnata supports the use of lower-carbon fuels, including biodiesel, hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) and other emerging fuel alternatives. In the financial year 2025–26, dnata increased its global consumption of alternative fuels by 89% year-on-year. This progress builds on a landmark achievement in the UAE in 2024, when dnata transitioned all non-electric airside vehicles in Dubai to biodiesel, reducing CO₂-equivalent emissions by more than 3,500 tonnes annually.
- Investment in renewable energy: dnata continues to invest in renewable energy across its facilities, including the installation of solar photovoltaic systems and the adoption of renewable electricity tariffs. In the financial year 2025–26, its onsite solar systems generated 5,126 MWh of electricity, while a further 24,564 MWh was sourced through renewable energy tariffs globally. As a result, renewables accounted for 15% of dnata’s total energy consumption.
- Waste reduction and resource efficiency: dnata is focused on reducing material consumption and waste, increasing recycling and reuse, and advancing circular solutions across its operations. In the financial year 2025–26, 47% of waste generated across dnata’s global operations was diverted from disposal.
This year’s ceremony also marked the launch of the UAE Companies for Good 2031 Strategy, a national framework designed to strengthen private sector contributions to advance the UAE’s Impact Economy and further enhance the country’s CSR, ESG and sustainability ecosystem.
For more information about Emirates’ and dnata’s sustainability initiatives, visit: https://www.emirates.com/media-centre/connecting-tomorrow/ and https://www.dnata.com/en/sustainability/environmental-initiatives/