Local efforts

Wherever we are, we act with respect to exert a positive impact on people and on the limited resources of our planet.

IKEA always tries to do more with less. This goes hand in hand with our environmental work - to use natural resources in an economical and prudent way.

The IKEA Group is involved in many national and local activities. Below you can read about those that are taking place in your local community.

Going Beyond Earth Hour

We'd like to say a big THANK YOU to those who came for the IKEA bulb exchange during the weekend! We have collected a total of 829 incandescent light bulbs.

Every small effort counts and we hope you'll be enjoying our SPARSAM low energy bulbs while saving Mother Earth!

Earth Hour at IKEA

Earth Hour is organised by World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). WWF’s mission is to stop the degradation of the Planet’s natural environment and to build a future in which humans live in harmony with nature.

It is held on the last Saturday of March annually, asking households and businesses to turn off their non-essential lights and other electrical appliances for one hour to raise awareness towards the need to take action on climate change.

Dinner at the IKEA Restaurants during Earth Hour 2012 was a huge success! We had also switched off the façade and external lights during Earth Hour. A total of $10,370.31 which was a 35% increase from last year, was collected from the sales proceeds at the IKEA Restaurant during this hour. This amount will be our sponsorship for the IKEA & Earth Hour 2012 campaign to WWF Singapore in support of your conservation works in Singapore.

Thank you for your support!

Find out more about WWF
Find out more about Earth Hour

Grow green - Recycle your Christmas tree.

From 1 - 15 January 2012, IKEA donated $5 to the Garden City Fund’s Plant-A-Tree programme for every IKEA Christmas tree brought back, to support their environmental efforts.All trees collected will be recycled into mulch.

Thank you for your support.

Soft toys fund project

Thanks to great global IKEA customer support and purchases, the IKEA Foundation had raised and donated €12.4 million to UNICEF and Save the Children projects to extend and start new children’s educational programs in developing countries.

The IKEA Foundation, the charitable function of IKEA, donated 1 euro for each 12.1 million soft toys sold in over 300 IKEA stores worldwide from November 1, 2011 to December 24, 2011. The IKEA Tampines and Alexandra stores raised 43,550 euros* and sold 43,550 soft toys.

Since 2003, the annual Soft Toy campaign has enabled donations of over 35.2 million euros, which has supported and helped 8 million children in almost 40 countries worldwide.

The IKEA Foundation believes all children should have access to a quality education. Thanks to this donation, UNICEF and Save the Children can extend current projects and start new ones in 22 countries including Africa, Eastern Europe and Asia. The projects contribute to better water and toilet facilities in schools, improve access to education for minority children, provide educational supplies and train teachers in child-friendly teaching techniques.

(1 euro is approximately S$1.75)

Be A Key Person This World Environment Day

Thank you for being A KEY PERSON during our Allen Key Recycling campaign. We collected 2840 Allen Keys between 5 June - 10 July 2011 and they have been sent off for recycling.

The Allen Key is a small iconic IKEA product made from highly-recyclable material - do not let it go unnoticed at home or let it disappear into your trash bin. Look around your home for any IKEA Allen Keys and bring them back to IKEA.

Simply drop them off in the box located near the Exchange & Returns counter. All Allen Keys collected will be sent for recycling.

Make a little effort for the environment. Every resource counts - big or small.

Say "No" to take away boxes

IKEA Alexandra and IKEA Tampines have stopped giving out free take-away boxes to reduce the impact of disposable packaging on the environment.

If you need one, you can still purchase it at 20cents. A total of $5197 has been collected over a 6–month period between Feb – July 2011 at IKEA Alexandra from the sales of disposable take-away boxes, and this was given to WWF Singapore to support their conservation efforts and activities in Singapore.

Over the following 6 months from August 2011 - Jan 2012, proceeds from the take-away boxes went to the Mangrove Horseshoe Crabs research work done by the Nature Society (Singapore).

All proceeds over the next 6 months starting Febraury 2012 go to WWF Singapore in support of the Sustainable Seafood campaign

Thank you for minimising the usage of disposable packaging!

Thank You for making this happen!

This World Environment Day, we are happy to be awarding 11 student groups! Their projects have been selected for our The Little Green Dot Research Grant Scheme! Jointly organized by IKEA Singapore, World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and Nature Society (Singapore), this grant allows students to conduct research on methods of conserving marine life and freshwater, helping to make Singapore a "little green dot" on our planet, using the funds collected from YOU whenever you purchase a plastic bag from IKEA!

The 11 projects come from various secondary schools and junior colleges, and they focus on:

- investigating factors affecting the growth of seagrass locally and the significance of seagrass to the ecosystem

- investigating growth factors of local coral reefs, and examining the impact of relocation on coral reefs

- conserving of Malayan flat-shelled terrapins in Singapore

- identifying and recommending conservation methods for the birds populations at the Kranji Marsh Park

- studying the impact of fish fertilisers on algal bloom in Singapore, which can be a cause of death for fishes in local fisheries

- investigating the ideal factors and environment for breeding of local freshwater species like loaches, rasboras and gouramies

- finding the ideal salinity conditions for local marine organisms and recommending factors to improve the health of marine life

- investigating the impact of land reclamation on the local marine ecosystem over time, and proposing strategies to strike a balance between reclamation and healthy marine biodiversity

- reducing organochlorines and toxicity in Singapore waters

- examining the impact of pollution and invasive species on the decline of ribbon seagrass in Singapore in hope of finding ways to conserve ribbon seagrass

- investigating the impact of oxygen concentration in local waters on growth of coral reefs

Practising environmentalists will be assigned as mentors to the grant recipients to provide guidance through the entirety of the project which will be completed by end of 2011.

Thank you for being a part of this!

Bicycle lots at IKEA Tampines

To encourage emission-free transportation to IKEA, bicycles lots are now available in IKEA Tampines. They are located next to the motorcycle lots near the entrance to the car park.

World Environment Day 2010

IKEA is always continuously looking to minimize the negative impact which our business operations may have on the environment. One of the many ways in doing so is to ensure that our waste streams are handled responsibly. Besides sending all possible waste factions for recycling, we also send our waste oil from both restaurants at IKEA Alexandra and IKEA Tampines to Alpha Biofuels for recycling into biodiesel to ensure that they are handled responsibly.

On 5 June 2010, World Environment Day, buses running on bio-diesel recycled from the waste cooking oil from both IKEA Restaurants took visitors from both IKEA stores to Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserves and Lower Peirce Reservoir for guided tours conducted by Nparks' guides.

Earth Day 2010

Earth Day, 22nd April 2010, marked the 3rd year since IKEA Singapore stopped giving out free plastic bags.

To continue encouraging usage of reusable bags, we gave out free BRATTBY blue bags to our customers in both IKEA Alexandra and IKEA Tampines on this day.

Since Earth Day 2007, all proceeds collected from the sales of our bio-degradable plastic bags go to World Wide Fund for Nature (Singapore) to assist the fieldwork in Riau province (Sumatra) that helps fight the haze that affects Singapore every year, by promoting sustainable forest management and developing alternative sustainable livelihood for the villagers. This addresses global warming at the same time, which is a long-term threat to Singapore.

SUNNAN lamp campaign

For every SUNNAN solar powered lamp sold in IKEA, one lamp will be given to UNICEF to light up the life of a child. This is a small but important contribution to improve the lives of children in developing countries.

IKEA has made an especially sturdy SUNNAN solar powered lamp for the developing world, designed to resist the wear and tear of difficult living situations, including a battery capable of withstanding high temperatures. This work lamp combines low-energy LED technology with solar panels, which requires 9-12 hours of sun and will give 4 hours of full light. This unit enables children to play, read, write and study at night, even if their homes have no electricity.

UNICEF has worked in Pakistan since 1947 and has a well developed relationship with local organisations and governments. These SUNNAN solar powered lamps will be distributed through UNICEF to children living in the areas without access to electricity in Pakistan.

SUNNAN comes in five bright colours and is sold at $29 at the IKEA Alexandra and IKEA Tampines stores.

Say "NO" to plastic bags

Consider this sobering fact – Singaporeans use 2.5 billion plastic bags a year. That is 2,500 plastic bags per year, for each family. Or almost 7 plastic bags a day per family. Most of these are often thrown away because although we use them for our trash daily, we can't deny that there will always be more bags than we actually need. This waste only means greater costs to our environment.

From 1 May 2010, all proceeds from the sales of IKEA's biodegradable plastic bags will go to the Little Green Dot student research grant. Jointly organized by IKEA Singapore, World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and Nature Society Singapore (NSS), the grant will allow students to conduct research on methods of conserving marine life and freshwater, helping to make Singapore a "little green dot" on our planet.

Most discarded plastic bags end up in the sea. This in turn, causes harm to marine species like turtles, dolphins and seals while polluting the beaches and coastal areas. Litter including plastic bags in water ways are known to release toxic particles through photo-degradation.

By saying NO to plastic bags, we are saving resources while reducing environmental pollution.

Learn more about the Nature Society (Singapore)

Recycling Waste Oil To Bio-diesel

All the waste oil from the restaurants in IKEA Alexandra and IKEA Tampines are sent to Alpha Biofuels to be recycled into bio-diesel. The main process used is trans-esterification. The bio-diesel produced can be used pure or blended with diesel, and is available locally for vehicles in Singapore.

Find out more about Alpha Biodiesel

Parking lots for Electric Motorcycles

To promote emission-free and affordable transportation in Singapore, parking lots for parking & charging electronic motorcycles are now available in the carparks of both IKEA stores.

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Local Efforts