How leading companies, NGOs and solution providers are working to address the myriad issues that can arise in any supply chain.
We’ve heard a lot recently about 2015 promising to be the year of sustainability — with global conferences on sustainable development and climate change, new UK legislation fighting modern day slavery, and the forthcoming UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), set to shape the global remit for social, economic and environmental development.One of the key goals of the SDGs is to achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls around the world. With this in mind, the post-2015 development agenda offers a great opportunity to drive lasting change for women’s rights and equality.
Heineken last week announced plans to team up with The United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) as part of a new sustainability initiative to support environmental and social growth movements in the developing world.
Last fall, HP became the first company in the IT industry to require direct employment of foreign migrant workers in its supply chain with the release of the HP Foreign Migrant Worker Standard.Three months after HP the release of this new standard for preventing exploitative labor practices and forced labor, Sustainable Brands spoke with Bob Mitchell, Global Manager of Supply Chain Social & Environmental Responsibility, to learn how the program is enabling HP to ethically recruit and manage foreign migrant workers.
Mars Chocolate UK and Fairtrade Foundation have extended their partnership to source Fairtrade-certified cocoa for MARS® Bars in the United Kingdom and Ireland by October 2015.Mars is the first UK company to announce a commitment under the new Fairtrade Cocoa Sourcing Programme, which aims to deliver more opportunities for cocoa farmers to sell on Fairtrade terms and connect them with businesses that actively support efforts to improve farmer livelihoods.In 2009, Mars committed to certifying its entire cocoa supply as being produced in a sustainable manner by 2020.
Last week, Safeway and Fair Trade USA announced a partnership to launch Fair Trade Certified™ seafood into the North American market. The program addresses both social and environmental responsibility in fishing communities across the globe. In March, Safeway will debut the world’s first Fair Trade fish – wild-capture tuna from small-scale fishermen in Indonesia – in its Northern California, Portland and Seattle Division stores.
Apple has terminated its relationships with 18 suppliers to date due to sustainability code violations, according to a new report from the technology company.
Only six major companies and one investor — Danone, Unilever, Nestlé, Procter & Gamble, Kao Corp., Reckitt Benckiser Group, and financial services giant HSBC — have comprehensive policies in place to protect tropical forests, according to a new ranking by Global Canopy Programme (GCP).
Companies are under increasing pressure to improve transparency across their supply chains and introduce more stringent procurement policies covering issues including human rights, corruption, and social and environmental impacts.
The availability of Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certified fish is better than ever with a million tons of MSC certified cod caught last year, but there is a growing gap between supermarkets that offer their customers ecolabelled sustainable seafood choices and protecting ocean environments, according to new figures released by MSC.Since 2010, Sainsbury’s has led the pack in terms of numbers of products stocked, with 163 MSC-certified seafood products for the last financial year, MSC says. The retailer’s product numbers are almost twice its closest competitor, Waitrose, which is in second place with 79 certified seafood products and more than three times the number of products stocked by M&S.
Unilever has announced that its Breyers, Fruttare, Magnum and Lipton brand products have all made significant commitments to responsible sourcing.Beginning this month, Breyers will only use real vanilla from Rainforest Alliance-certified vanilla beans from Madagascar. The company will now also only source milk and cream from farmers who don’t treat their cows with artificial growth hormones, making Breyers the largest packaged U.S. ice cream brand to do so.
Eighty organizations with more than $100 billion in purchasing power have signed up to pilot a multi-sector program designed to help organizations reduce their risks and contribute to a more sustainable future.The Sustainable Purchasing Leadership Council’s (SPLC) Guidance for Leadership in Sustainable Purchasing v1.0 offers purchasers detailed advice for promoting market innovation and optimizing the environmental, social and economic performance of their supply chains.
Walmart, Target and Forum for the Future (FFTF) have established three working groups to take forward actions agreed at last year’s beauty and personal care (BPC) product sustainability summit, according to ChemicalWatch. The groups will focus on aspects of chemicals in products.Working Group 1 — Supply Chain Information Sharing
US nationwide floral directory Slow Flowers is encouraging its customers to show their love in a more thoughtful way this Valentine’s day by sourcing local American-grown bouquets.The US cut flower retail market is flourishing, with sales topping US$7-8 billion annually. However, apparently only 2 percent of the 224 million roses sold in 2012 were American-grown. The US flower market has been dominated for decades by 1-800 teleflorists who import their bouquets from overseas. In an attempt to change this trend and support local farmers, Slow Flowers now has a directory of roughly 500 florists committed to sourcing their flowers from the US for Valentine’s Day this year.
Six more global brands have committed to the Textile Exchange’s Responsible Down Standard (RDS). The adidas Group, Black Diamond, Kathmandu, NAU, REI and Timberland have agreed to bring certified, responsible down to the marketplace.
Chipotle is walking its “Food with Integrity” talk with the decision this week to eliminate carnitas from the menu at about a third of its 1,800 U.S. locations, after discovering that one of its pork suppliers violated the company’s animal-welfare policies.“Without this pork, we cannot get enough pork that meets our Responsibly Raised standard for all our restaurants, and we will not be able to serve carnitas in some locations,” Chipotle said in a statement, though the company declined to name the supplier in question.
The Hershey Company has announced that 30 percent of its globally sourced cocoa was independently certified and verified in 2014—this reflects an accelerated pace for achieving its goal of sourcing 100 percent of its cocoa supply from certified and sustainable cocoa farms by 2020.The announcement follows the company’s 2013 achievement of sourcing 18 percent certified cocoa globally, nearly double its original goal of 10 percent for the first year of its 2020 commitment.Following this accelerated progress, Hershey also announced a new target to source at least 50 percent certified cocoa by the end of 2015, reaching its 2016 goal of 40 and 50 percent one year ahead of schedule.
BMW Group, Hydro, Nestlé Nespresso SA and Rio Tinto Alcan and other members of the Aluminum Stewardship Initiative (ASI) have generated a new Standard to help improve environmental and social standards for sourcing the material, as well as government performance to improve the sector’s conditions throughout its value chain. The new Standard also aims to reduce the industry’s greenhouse gas emissions, which are historically high.
The Electronic Industry Citizenship Coalition (EICC), a nonprofit coalition of electronics companies dedicated to supply chain responsibility, has announced that it will conduct shadow audits and increase its industry and government engagement in Malaysia to further combat forced labor.The EICC says it has been working for more than a decade to support the rights and wellbeing of workers and communities worldwide affected by the global electronics supply chain. Although the EICC Code of Conduct bans trafficked and forced labor, completely eradicating it in the global electronics industry supply chain remains a challenge for everyone—including EICC members.
A new guide has been launched to guide food and drink manufacturers on sustainable use of the world’s most contentious and widely used vegetable oil.The Food and Drink Federation (FDF), the voice of the food and drink manufacturing industry — the UK's largest manufacturing sector — has launched a new sourcing guide to help manufacturers to sustainably source palm oil. The guide should be particularly helpful in light of the EU's new Food Information for Consumers regulation that went into effect earlier this month, which requires all food business operators in the UK to identify products containing palm oil.
McDonald's has initiated two sustainable beef integration programs with Beef + Lamb New Zealand, ANZCO Foods and Silver Fern Farms as part of its aspiration to source verified sustainable beef around the world.The program will highlight a range of best practices, from the farm all the way to the McDonald's customer. It will work with farmers and processors to identify and develop good management practices that support sustainable beef production. This means sustainable production systems, lower inputs, use of new technologies and a focus on animal welfare.An important component of the initiative is using real farm businesses to model the principles and demonstrate success to the wider farming community through workshops, field days and social media.