In the province of Luxembourg, where Seeing’s Belgian partner is situated, in the Commune of Vielsalm, the social economy has shown remarkable growth. Links with the conventional economy are highly sought after by social enterprises. One example is the development within the ETA (adapted work enterprise) “Le Saupont”, which has existed since 1970, and which has had their primary activity of contract packaging, mainly for one very large customer.

For several years, the markets were stable and the people in positions of power were rarely required to solicit new business opportunities or to diversify. The economic crisis has changed this and the primary concern of the enterprise was to change or risk seeing a substantial proportion of its activity and vulnerable staff disappear.

The challenges were considerable: diversify the activity to find new customers, train all staff so as not to leave anybody on the street and optimise the enterprise in terms of environmental impacts to bring cost savings.

Le Saupont had to therefore refocus its activities towards being a key partner for small and large enterprises which needed to subcontract a stage of their manufacturing process: product/goods contract packaging, cosmetic packaging, food packaging, logistics management, etc.

Economically speaking, the diversification has been a success.

Le Saupont can now offer to take over an extremely large part of the production cycle for a range of products. Le Saupont’s  principle  find is, within the production cycles, the chains whose added value has become too low for the traditional labour market in Belgium, whilst remaining within the technical scope of the ETA’s workers. Currently, Le Saupont wishes to continue its diversification by building operational partnerships with conventional enterprises, each contributing its own added value to the production cycle.

Mr. Jean Pierre Gribomont, who was the head of the Chamber of Commerce in the Province of Luxembourg before he became director of “Le Saupont” six years ago, is clear and direct: “An enterprise must achieve results and make profit if it wishes to play a social role.”

In this regard, he has modified the financial structure of his ETA, transforming it from an Asbl (non-profit organisation) into a Société commerciale à responsabilité limitée (private limited liability corporate entity) and a Société à finalité sociale (social enterprise).

This transformation certainly was not easy, as the search for profit led to some hesitation among certain board members and indirectly created tension within the enterprise. However, the results are evident and the development is real and today, around 150 people with disabilities work in these facilities in the various manufacturing and service sectors.

In terms of the construction of the new production hall at La Saupont, which opened in 2009, 2 areas in particular have been monitored and developed; the social area and the environmental area.

Through their support to disabled people through adapted workplaces, these people are offered new life changes, which will prepare them to tackle new occupations in improved ergonomic conditions.

Among the areas of strategic development supported by the Board of Directors, there is one that, beyond the social purpose that every ETA must respect, is the guiding principle of day-to-day management: “to enrich tasks by encouraging and facilitating the expression of individual capabilities.”

Each worker is therefore invited to take charge of all or part of a higher-level function than the one they carry out on a daily basis.

The required support helps them – periods of support and training with an informed tutor ensure the success of this approach. Job enrichment thus contributes towards individual development and improves the quality of daily life.

In environmental terms, the organisation of waste sorting and waste recovery have led to the production and optimisation of the use of energy from the existing co-generation unit, by employing the most modern techniques.

Waste wood is recovered using a CCHP process; a device that generates electricity, hot water (heating) as well as cooling (refrigerated rooms and air conditioning). At the same time, an advanced sorting-recycling system has been installed, bringing value to more than 95% of the waste products. The next step will be to reduce the consumption of heavy machinery and tools by optimising their operating cycle.

All these initiatives, have led to “Les Ateliers du Saupont” being named the prize winner of the Godefroid award for Sustainable Development in the Province of Luxembourg in 2009, and again being awarded in 2013 in Trends Tendances (a top Belgian magazine in terms of economics) as a pioneering enterprise in terms of sustainable management.