BASF strives to foster an inclusive working environment with room for diversity and where people encounter mutual respect, trust and appreciation. We connect people with different backgrounds, views and perspectives on an equal footing. Promoting and valuing diversity across all hierarchical levels is an integral part of our strategy and is also embedded in our corporate values.

Employees should be able to contribute their individual perspectives and skills in an inclusive working environment. As a global company, we serve many different customer needs. We want to reflect, value and promote this diversity among our employees in order to increase their creativity, motivation and sense of belonging to BASF.

Promoting diversity has positive consequences for BASF, for example through having an inclusive working environment and a more diverse workforce. Negative consequences could arise if our employees lose their sense of belonging, we are no longer perceived as an attractive employer or not all customers feel that we appeal to them. We systematically record short and long-term opportunities and risks as part of our general opportunity and risk management.

As a global company, we promote diversity and are committed to treating one another with respect at BASF.

We expect our leaders to create an inclusive working environment and promote diversity. This is why it is one of our focal points in our leadership development. For example, our leaders learned about promoting openness as part of the CORE Leadership Values online training series. This training supports them in what they can specifically do to make the work environment more inclusive for all employees and how they can live up to their role model function and develop further in this respect.

In addition, we expect all employees to create an environment in which different aspects of diversity and individual strengths are valued. With the Diversity Moments format, we offer teams concise information, everyday examples and reflection exercises on the topic of diversity and inclusion. In 2023, as part of the global employee survey, we again used the inclusion index as a relevant point of reference for the inclusion of our employees and provided our leaders with suggestions for follow-up measures.

In Brazil, there is an initiative to attract, retain and include people with disabilities in BASF. Among other things, we are focusing on improving the accessibility of our Brazilian sites and our internal and external communication channels. With further measures as part of the initiative, we want to ensure that we consider more people with disabilities in the recruitment process and offer them specific training opportunities. The project team works closely with leaders, the HR department and the local network of employees with disabilities.

BASF Group employee age structure

(Total: 111,991, of which 26.7% women, as of December 31, 2023)

Diversity also relates to the company’s demographic profile. Our aim is to create a suitable framework to help maintain the employability of our personnel at all stages of life and ensure the availability of qualified employees over the long term.

As we are convinced that better decisions are made by considering diverse perspectives, we set up a Shadow Board for BASF sites in Africa and the Middle East in 2023. The Shadow Board is made up of younger employees and advises the leadership team on strategic and operational topics. Using this reverse monitoring approach, we want to broaden and enrich the perspectives of the leadership team and bridge the gap between hierarchical levels and between generations.

We also promote diversity in the selection and development of our leaders. We have set a global target to promote female leadership and aim to increase the proportion of women in leadership positions to 30% by 2030. We have made important progress toward this and continually review our target. In the BASF Group, the global proportion of female leaders with disciplinary responsibility was 28.4% at the end of 2023 (2022: 27.2%).

To enable our management to monitor progress toward this target, we have developed a global dashboard that is used to regularly review the status of implementation. The systematic advancement of women is an integral part of our process for selecting senior executives and is regularly addressed in strategic dialogs with the divisions at the level of the Board of Executive Directors and in the Board’s strategic talent discussions. In addition, we offer various opportunities to help female executives strengthen their network and increase their visibility at senior executive level.

Furthermore, we consistently take part in specific career events to specifically reach and attract female talent from various disciplines. We focus on our female employees as role models on our social media channels and with various initiatives such as career fairs and networking events aimed specifically at women.

As a signatory to the United Nations’ Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs), we are committed to promoting gender equality. We are also involved in other external initiatives to promote inclusion of diversity and equal opportunities in the workplace, such as the Business for Inclusive Growth (B4IG) initiative. In addition, we are an active member of the Charta der Vielfalt (German diversity charter), which aims to promote diversity and inclusion with a holistic approach.

• More information on diversity in the Board of Executive Directors and the Supervisory Board
• More information on diversity and inclusion