RKW supports various local health care initiatives

Frankenthal, Germany, May 8, 2020 – RKW takes its social responsibility seriously and supports the health care system with donations and other initiatives at various company locations.

The RKW Group, headquartered in Frankenthal (Germany), a global manufacturer of plastic films for areas of hygiene and agricultural films, films for the beverage industry and packaging for powdery goods, has donated a total of around 5,000 surgical masks to medical or nursing facilities at three of its locations in Germany.

For Harald Biederbick, CEO of RKW SE, this was an obvious step to take: "We are part of the community and we take our local responsibility seriously. We have seen how difficult it is for medical facilities, of all places, to obtain personal protective equipment that they need most. We had some, so we were happy to share. This also goes hand in hand with our business mission, namely to help actively improve people's lives with our products."

At the Frankenthal, Petersaurach and Gronau sites, around 1,600 surgical protective masks were distributed to clinics, nursing homes, care services and doctors' and rehabilitation practices each when supplies were particularly difficult to organize at the beginning of April.

For the Mayor of Frankenthal, Martin Hebich, for example, this was a great help: "Many patients of the city hospital are particularly in need of protection. We also have a special duty of care towards our roundabout 600 employees. Therefore we are very grateful to RKW for the spontaneous and unexpected donation".

The fact that RKW even had so many masks in stock was due to the outbreak of the COVID 19 epidemic in China at the beginning of the year. "We produce in Guangzhou and were therefore aware of the coming difficulties early on and stocked up on time. We wanted to be prepared to be able to equip our employees worldwide with protective masks at short notice if necessary," says Biederbick.

In addition to the masks, RKW is also committed to protecting people with other means from its own production. For example, RKW Wasserburg helped to provide safe care for COVID-19 patients in the intensive care unit of the Rosenheim hospital with a foil donation. The bus drivers in Grafschaft Bentheim are protected from all too close contact with passengers by a barrier made of foil from the RKW site in Nordhorn. And in a joint venture with Renault Trucks, the employees of the French production site in Castelletta (Greater Lyon) produce disposable protective aprons made from donated RKW film in their leisure time, which are made available to the clinics in the region.

In addition, RKW is involved in the production of around 750,000 FFP-2 masks for the Ministry of Social Affairs in Baden-Württemberg every month–as a contractor for the FIGHT consortium–and is demonstrating its competence and flexibility here.

+49 (0)621 -18 038 139
stephan.demaria@rkw-group.com

The RKW Group is an independent, privately owned company headquartered in Mannheim, Germany and one of the world’s foremost manufacturers of excellent film solutions. RKW is the market leader in the areas of hygiene and agricultural films, films for the beverage industry and packaging for powdery goods. In addition, the company makes films and nonwovens for medical applications, for the chemical and converting industries as well as for the construction sector. RKW’s sustainable films enable its customers to improve the daily life of consumers all over the world. In the fiscal year 2020, RKW generated total sales of EUR 784 million. About 3,000 employees process 350,000 metric tons of plastic materials at 19 locations around the world. True to the corporate slogan “When excellence matters”, the company, which was founded in 1957, offers outstanding performance in terms of quality and service. Respect and reliability are the core values of RKW and form the basis of the company’s success.

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