20 Years Of Family Support – Wintershall Dea Company Kindergarten KiWi Celebrates its Anniversary
- Pioneer for family support has been enabling equal job opportunities for men and women for two decades
- Company kindergarten is an attractive location factor
- Certified care concept supports early childhood education in the areas of STEM, sustainability, and health
The Wintershall Dea company kindergarten KiWi is celebrating its 20th anniversary. It opened its doors for the first time on 6 August 2001 for 30 children of colleagues at the headquarters in Kassel. Since then, the team has looked after around 500 girls and boys from over 20 nations aged from zero to 12 while their parents were working for the company. The company runs the day care centre and accompanying nursery together with the institution Impuls Soziales Management Die Familienexperten gGmbH.
On behalf of the entire company, Wintershall Dea CEO Mario Mehren congratulates KiWi on this anniversary and thanks the kindergarten for the collaboration: “The extensive, innovative and inclusive childcare offered by the KiWi daycare centre has also shaped the workforce at Wintershall Dea. Through this cooperation we have been supporting families at the company for 20 years and, in so doing, helping to reconcile family and working life – for mothers and fathers. The childcare at KiWi also allows parents a flexible return to work after being on parental leave.” The long opening hours of the day care centre also allow colleagues with children to plan their working hours individually, hence boosting their work-life balance.
Support in reconciling family and a working life is an important factor for recruiting and retaining employees. Petra Angstmann, SVP Global Human Resources at Wintershall Dea, emphasizes: “The company kindergarten is a clear location advantage for us in Kassel. It improves the appeal of our company as an employer both in Germany and abroad and has already convinced many parents – and children.” Since the offer of subsidised childcare places is aimed at all parents working in the company’s headquarters in Kassel, KiWi also contributes to reaching diversity goals. “We are of course improving equal job opportunities for men and women through the offer of childcare. In addition, the concept of company childcare also convinces international experts to come to Kassel and work for Wintershall Dea,” Angstmann adds.
The company kindergarten KiWi was certified in 2019 by the non-profit foundation “Haus der kleinen Forscher” (Little Scientists’ House) as an institution that promotes early childhood education in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), with the aim of making girls and boys strong for the future and inspiring enjoyment in learning and discovering new things. Janine May, head of the day care centre sponsor Impuls Soziales Management, explains: “The children are already introduced through play at a very young age to topics such as health, nature and sustainability. Through this stimulus we enable them to already act early on in a responsible and sustainable manner.” The sponsor of the 27 company and 13 public day care centres across Germany has already been supporting companies for 25 years to allow their employees to reconcile family and working life.
On 25 August, Mario Mehren was there to congratulate the KiWi team on the anniversary and present a voucher for an interactive story time with storyteller Andrea Ortolano to the 50 or so girls and boys currently being looked after at the centre. Apart from the KiWi, Wintershall Dea has been providing the WiKi childcare at the technology park Marbachshöhe to our colleagues with families. The Hamburg headquarters provide day care service in the close-by City Nord.
About Wintershall Dea
Wintershall Dea is Europe’s leading independent natural gas and oil company with more than 120 years of experience as an operator and project partner along the entire E&P value chain. The company with German roots and headquarters in Kassel and Hamburg explores for and produces gas and oil in 13 countries worldwide in an efficient and responsible manner. With activities in Europe, Russia, Latin America and the MENA region (Middle East & North Africa), Wintershall Dea has a global upstream portfolio and, with its participation in natural gas transport, is also active in the midstream business. More in our Annual Report.
As a European gas and oil company, we support the EU's 2050 carbon neutrality target. As our contribution we have set ourselves ambitious targets: We want to be net zero across our entire upstream operations – both operated and non-operated – by 2030. This includes Scope 1 (direct) and Scope 2 (indirect) greenhouse gas emissions on an equity share basis. In addition, Wintershall Dea will bring methane emissions intensity below 0.1 per cent by 2025 and maintain zero routine flaring of associated gas in its operations. The climate goals are to be achieved through portfolio optimization, emissions reduction through more energy efficiency, investments in nature-based compensation solutions and in future technologies such as hydrogen and CCS. You can find more about this in our Sustainability Report.
Wintershall Dea was formed from the merger of Wintershall Holding GmbH and DEA Deutsche Erdoel AG, in 2019. Today, the company employs around 2,500 people worldwide from over 60 nations
