Section 2 i) Initial Research Work - Gewerbliche Schule Ravensburg

• Do you monitor travelling expenses?Answer: yes we monitor all travel expenses, such as freight transport andhaulage, these are handled by external companies and a detailed report is providedwith every shipment so that our company can monitor the co2 output and expenses.• How many countries do you get materials from?Answer: we ship our circuit boards from India or China, but the rest of our materialscome from local providers. And the printing of the circuit boards are all done in houseto minimise the transportation weight thus saving on fuel and reducing co2emissions.• Have you noticed a raise in energy cost in the last 5 years?Answer: yes, RAFI continue to monitor costs and negotiate the best rate for thecompany as well as use renewable energy suppliers.• Have you looked into using fewer raw materials or to bring in readymadecomponents?Answer: yes, but if the company decide to bring in readymade components it wouldminimise the jobs in the company. This will affect the transport prices and in the longrun the company will be worse off and so will the environment, because the addedweight to the transport will lead to more emissions and an increase in shippingcharges.When we were able to go to RAFI we asked the same set of questions that we hadasks MTU. We found that they use straight transport to transport their products toothe customers. We found out that they do not know how far their products traveloverall as it depends on where their customers are located. RAFI gets their rawmaterials form local suppliers and times global network suppliers such as India andchina. We also found out that they support their local environment and they try to dotheir best to reduce the amount of pollution in their area. They do this by trying topresent making it in the first place but however if this is not possible they minimise,reuse and recycle waste that they have produced.26