About Ihobe

Ihobe is a publicly-owned company coming under the Basque Government's Ministry of Economic Development, Sustainability and the Environment.

Strategic Plan 2021

Greetings from the Director

As part of a department that drives the economic policy and competitiveness of the main economic sectors in the Basque Country, IHOBE, the public environmental management company of the Basque Government, is in a unique position. There is also a need to promote the recovery of the Basque Country based on policies derived from the European Green Deal, which encompasses many areas that this public company has been addressing for several years, such as the circular economy, climate change, soil protection and biodiversity.

The European Green Deal is one of the main mechanisms for steering a way out of the crisis and achieving a more sustainable future. The Basque Government transfers the spirit of this commitment to the Basque Country through the Basque Green Deal. The main areas of this economic and environmental roadmap are: Climate Ambition, Clean, Safe and Affordable Energy, Circular Economy, Energy Efficiency and Sustainable Construction, Sustainable Mobility, Farm to Table, and Zero Pollution.

We must all work together to make sustainability an intrinsic part of product and service development. The governance of the transformation process must explicitly recognise the role of sustainability as a factor of competitiveness. To achieve this, innovation must be promoted by improving sustainability in the smart specialisation strategy, and a common set of tools must be developed to facilitate dialogue and cooperation between socio-economic agents on the subject of sustainability.

This is enshrined in the purpose of the Department for Economic Development, Sustainability and Environment: “accelerate an economic revival, creating jobs by harnessing digital, ecological, and social-health transformations as opportunities improve the competitiveness of the productive structure, and integrate environmental criteria into all sectoral policies, not as a condition, but as a competitive factor to create value.” It is precisely here that Ihobe is aligned and plays a key role in the deployment of this legislature’s programme.

Our approach is comprehensive. The new Ihobe Strategic Plan 2024 covers the entire cycle of public policies and is based on innovation, to contribute to the environmentally sustainable development of the Basque Country and our proportional share of the overall Sustainable Development Goals as a reference, embodied in the Basque Country Agenda 2030. We are committed to sustainability!

Alexander Boto Bastegieta
General Manager

Mission, Vision and Values

4. Mission

To catalyse the generation and dissemination of environmental knowledge.
To work with companies, the public sector and at grassroots level.
To contribute and play an active role in improving the environment
To share knowledge and resources, from excellence and social responsibility

5. Vision

Ihobe seeks to be an effective contributor and authoritative advisor of the Basque Government, and shares its expertise with society and the stakeholders of the sector in order to foster solutions and services in line with the environmental targets of the BAC.

Ihobe is a catalyst for environmental knowledge, and drives and fosters its generation and contributes to its dissemination.

Values

Credibility and involvement
Effective management and teamwork
Spreading faith in change
From our environment and to our environment

Commitment to Equality

Several years ago, the Ihobe management team and staff decided to take a step further to specify and systematise its commitment to gender equality, which is set out in the III Plan for Gender Equality and the Gender Perspective 2018-2020.

This plan, which is in keeping with the responsible governance strategy of this public entity and with its action plan, assumes a strategic commitment to integrate specific actions in the management of the organisation. Those actions showcase the gender commitment from an approach based on planning, coordinating and allocating resources to implement and assess the plan, by seeking to impact our workers and society.

The Ihobe’s III Plan for Gender Equality has 29 objectives and 21 actions grouped into four blocks, following the guidelines of the VII Plan for Gender Equality in the Basque Autonomous Community, and including:

Good governance
Empowerment
Social and economic transformation
Lives free from gender violence.

Since 2015, Ihobe has been recognised by Emakunde, the Basque Institute for Women, as a “Partner entity for gender equality".

Strategic objectives

Five main strategic objectives underpin Ihobe's environmental actions:

Conserving ecosystems
Improving environmental quality
Sustainable management of resources and waste
Citizenry and public-private co-responsibility
Streamlining and simplifying environmental administration

Corporate Policy

Ihobe aims to improve the environment, integrating environmental criteria in sectorial policies as a sustainable and competitive element of value for our country and its organisations.

We are an exemplary and innovative public organisation that fosters environmental improvement in the Basque Country, in collaboration with public administrations, companies and citizens. We seek to become an environmental benchmark in the Basque Country and work towards the international positioning of the Basque Country as an advanced region in environmental friendliness and sustainability.

The SDGs 2030, set out in the Basque Country Agenda 2030, are our reference to align our activity with a universal, integrated and transforming action plan to foster sustainable human development.

To do so, we integrate and address the expectations and demands of the different stakeholders and we use this Corporate Policy to carry out our activity in line with the following four pillars:

Advanced public management

Adopting advanced Corporate Governance practices, achieving efficiency and continuously improving the activities we develop through the adoption of sustainable practices, administering our resources responsibly and effectively.

Managing risks that may affect the fulfilment of the organisation’s objectives, minimising these risks and taking advantage of opportunities.

Fostering the appropriate safe, sustainable and healthy work conditions to protect our people and our suppliers and clients, ensuring the integration of risk prevention in all levels of our activity.

Fulfilling the requirements set out in the regulations and legal frameworks that are applicable to us or those that we voluntarily adopt.

Motivated and responsible people, committed to equality and Basque

Involving, motivating and gaining the satisfaction of our people, through leadership and professional development.
Commitment to standardisation in the presence, use and management of Basque by our organisation and its staff.

Establishing measures aimed at ensuring the equal treatment of men and women in the workplace and in employment quality, as well as the entity’s external actions and specific actions to prevent and address sexual and gender harassment.

Addressing the needs of our clients in collaboration with our suppliers

Building a sustainable relationship with our suppliers and ensuring equal treatment and the principle of concurrence through transparent, objective and impartial processes.

Transparent communication to different stakeholders of relevant and accurate information on the activities carried out to address and satisfy their demands. Continuously adding value to our clients through trust and ongoing dialogue.

Promoting a network of alliances and fostering innovation as part of our identity

Weaving a network of alliances based on trust and mutual success. Fostering creativity, inspiration and innovation management as a future guarantee and lever for competitiveness improvement.

Systematising the training, analysis, enhancement and dissemination of useful information through the Monitoring and Intelligence process to provide added value to our clients.
Working to protect the environment and prevent contamination from a sustainable approach, through exemplariness and involvement of all Ihobe people in environmental and social improvement, beyond our activity.

2020 Ihobe Corporate Policy

One of Ihobe's hallmarks is its focus on ongoing cooperation with other public and private organisations. The relationship is based on trust, proximity and, above all, on the conviction that these dynamics of environmental policy cooperation is to the general benefit of Basque society overall.

Ihobe works closely with the following entities:

Environmental Policy and Strategy

Contaminated soil

Environmental Product Innovation

Eco-efficient industry

Responsible Administration

IVAP - Basque Institute of Public Administration

Biodiversity

Waste

Climate Change

Eco-innovation:

Municipality and Local Sustainability

Knowledge transfer

University of the Basque Country – Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea (UPV/EHU)

Management Excellence

Equality

2021 Progress Reports

The Basque Government overall strategy sets some major environmental challenges to be addressed by 2024.

Ihobe is already tackling these, and they will determine future projects such as climate action, protecting our natural assets and boosting a circular economy.

Since December 2020, Ihobe has had a new Management Plan 2021 approved by its Board of Directors chaired by Arantxa Tapia, advisor for Economic Development, Sustainability and the Environment.

These reports present a summary of the most significant areas for Ihobe during the first quarter of the year.

Ihobe is a publicly-owned company coming under the Environmental Office of the Basque Government's Ministry for the Environment, Territorial Planning and Housing, which in turn is made up of three divisions (Environmental Administration, Natural Heritage and Climate Change) and which also includes URA, the Basque Water Agency.

The Ministry also includes the Housing Office and the Territorial Planning Office..

The Ihobe Board of Directors is the management authority and represents this publicly-owned company and is made up of a minimum of three members and a maximum of seven, appointed by the General Meeting of Shareholders. .

Ihobe is structured around a General Management Division and three operational areas - Administration, Communication and Technical -, along with a total of 12 management units.

The Board of Directors is the management authority and represents the company and is made up of a minimum of three and a maximum of seven members, who are appointed by the General Meeting of the Shareholders subject to the current legislation and articles of association.

The powers of the Board of Directors are laid down in the articles of association and include:

Representing the company in any type of acts and contracts.
Approving the annual Management Plan, which shall include the budget proposals, and carrying out partial assessments of its execution.
Approving the corporate social responsibility of the Company and implementing control and supervisory functions of its degree of application.

Participants:

Pursuant to the Ihobe articles of association, its Board of Directors is made up of no less than 3 and no more than 7 members.

aranzazu_tapia

CHAIR

Ms. Arantxa Tapia Otaegui

Minister for Economic Development, Sustainability and Environment

DEPUTY CHAIR

Ms. Amaia Barneo Martín

Deputy Minister for the Environment

MEMBERS

Mr. Javier Agirre Orcajo

Environmental Administration Director

MEMBERS

Alberto José Fernández González

Director of Technology and Strategy

MEMBERS

Ane Etxenausia Aramburuzabala

Director of Tax Administration

MEMBERS

Olga Martín García

Aclima General Director

NON-EXECUTIVE SECRETARY

Mr. José Antonio Armolea Solabarrieta

Lawyer and Coordinator of the HR and General Administration Unit.

GENERAL MANAGER

Alexander Boto Basteguieta

Statistical Information quality service

IHOBE IN FIGURES

Ihobe is made up of 50 professionals

36 Women

14 Men

Average age

47 years old

Higher education qualifications

78%

Staff on reduced working day

44%

Results with customers

DEPLOYMENT OF THE ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY, KNOWLEDGE GENERATION AND AWARENESS RAISING

Stakeholder	Projects, initiatives and results obtained
COMPANIES	177 Basque companies working on Ecodesign: 105 ISO 14006 Ecodesign standard certified, 38 with the European ecolabel and 34 with environmental product declaration 9 major companies partners of the Basque EcoDesign Center and 12 ecoinnovation projects implemented 648 participants in the training, information and sharing best practices sessions. 371 delegates at the “Ecoefficiency-Ekosteguna Thursdays” 75 Ekoscan certified organisation, 1277 ISO 14001 certified and 88 companies EMAS registered 7 reports on environmental trends 9 new technologies included in the Basque List of Clean Technologies with an investment of €1,827,122. 19 circular economy demonstration projects 1263 environmental consultations processed by the free Environmental Information Service - Ihobe-Line.
MUNICIPALITIES	10 municipal innovation projects on climate change, natural capital and the circular economy in the Udalsarea 21 “Berringurumena 2016” call 5 Udalsarea 21 working groups
OTHER AUTHORITIES	54 greened specifications by Basque institutions (450 in total) 1 new greened product/service category (42 in total)
GENERAL PUBLIC	• 1,429,152 visits to the Ihobe website, 7,997 subscriptions to the newsletter and 12,020 social media followers With respect to Ekoetxea Urdaibai, Txingudi and Peñas Negras: 73,705 visits and 431 activities organised, with an average satisfaction rating of 9.2. Visited by 20,379 students in the School Educational Programme 302 appearances in the media

Impact of our projects

Ihobe produces an annual Customer Management Report, which seeks to globally analyse all aspects related to managing its customers – companies, municipalities, other authorities and the general public (Ekoetxeak visitors) - and to set out the main conclusions of that analysis.

In 2016:

Companies

The global satisfaction of companies with the Ihobe services was 7.9 out of 10

Municipalities

The global satisfaction of the municipalities with the Ihobe services was 7.7 out of 10

Ekoetxeak visitors

The global satisfaction of the visitors to the Ekoetxeak centres was 9.25 out of 10

Improvement measures

After analysing the global customer satisfaction, new needs and expectations were identified, resulting in a final proposal for a plan of action setting out the improvement measures to be implemented in 2017.

The main customer requirements are set out below.

Companies

Corporate customers continued to seek a pooling of experiences and a transfer of applied knowledge, with greater specialisation and an approachable and sectoral format to build relationships.

As regards the action projects (demonstration, ecodesign, ecoinnovation), they asked for prior mentoring by Ihobe to help identify the key stakeholders and existing opportunities and barriers right from the design stage.

Fundamentally, companies lacking resources (SMEs) asked for support for environmental monitoring (legislation, technology, market).

Municipalities

The Municipalities customers prioritised aspects where they believed further work was needed even though they had been developed in 2016. The aspects identified are as follows (in decreasing order):

Applied technical knowledge and guidance
Innovation, initiative and creativity
Anticipating needs
Team work
Coordination and dialogue with the stakeholders
Proximity and accessibility

Local authorities also called for support in seeking funding. Possible sources of finance to meet the objectives of Us21 and its members were therefore analysed.

Ekoetxeak visitors

General Public customers (Ekoetxeak visitors) saw the need to expand the promotion of activities organised at the different centres, along with advertising them.

Public authorities

The requirements of the Public authority customers (participants in the Green Public Procurement Programme) remained unchanged, but they reorganised their priorities. They thus requested advice on greening specification and training both on precise aspects aimed at specific stakeholders and general training on Green Public Procurement as priority aspects.

RESPONSIBLE GOVERNANCE

In 2009, the Basque Government approved the “Guide for the Responsible Governance of the Entities, Companies and Foundations of the Public Sector of the Basque Autonomous Community” A strategy was thus established to make the information and management of the public institutions more accessible and transparent to the general public and interest groups.

Ihobe is therefore making available for society different corporate and management documents to progress along the path towards good responsible governance:

Commitment to Equality

Ihobe is immersed in the implementation of its III Equality Plan after the II Plan ended in 2017.

The achievements of the latter include recognition as a “Collaborating Entity in Equality” by the Basque Institute for Women-Emakunde; the active participation in the “Public Entities for Equality Network" and the "Bai Sarea” network; the launch of a pilot scheme to “incorporate the gender perspective in Ihobe projects”, or contracting women who are victims of gender-based violence through the Emaktiva programme, an experience recognised as a Emakunde and Euskalit best practice.

As a result of running the II Equality Plan, work has also begun on defining equality procurement clauses to be included in the procurements processes of this entity.