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Walking the Talk
Newsweek Names L’Oréal, Unilever, CVS 2017's Top Corporate Sustainability Performers

Newsweek has released the results of its 2017 Global 500 Green Rankings, an annual assessment of the sustainability performance of the largest publicly-traded companies in the US and the world by revenue. This year, beauty giant L’Oréal came out on top, ranking as the top-performing global company and best performing personal products company.

Newsweek has released the results of its 2017 Global 500 Green Rankings, an annual assessment of the sustainability performance of the largest publicly-traded companies in the US and the world by revenue. This year, beauty giant L’Oréal came out on top, ranking as the top-performing global company and best performing personal products company.

The ranking is based on eight sustainability and environmental indicators including energy use, greenhouse gas emissions, carbon and water productivity, as well as the presence of executive, board and third-party oversight mechanisms.

“We’re honored to be recognized by Newsweek for our sustainability practices, as these touch every aspect of our business,” said Danielle Azoulay, Assistant VP of CSR & Sustainability at L’Oréal USA. “Sustainability drives our research and innovation in exciting ways and reinforces our commitment to our employees and the communities in which we operate. We’re continuously pushing ourselves to innovate, produce and develop more sustainably while also helping to empower our customers to make more sustainable choices.”

Through its global sustainability program, Sharing Beauty With All, L’Oréal is committed to reducing its environmental footprint, strengthening its positive social impacts and transforming how it operates, innovates, designs and manufactures its products. In 2017, for the second year in a row, L’Oréal was one of only two companies in the world (the other being Unilever) to score an “A” for all three of CDP’s programs for its efforts in climate protection, sustainable water management and addressing deforestation. Rounding out the top three were Centrica PLC and Enbridge Inc, with respective scores of 88.7 and 86 percent.

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Multinational technological conglomerate and Sustainable Brands member Cisco Systems received top honors on the US ranking for 2017 and secured a number five spot on the global ranking with its score of 83.7 percent. The company received full marks for energy productivity and showed strong performance in the waste (81.3 percent) and water (75 percent) categories. Cisco also ranked as the best performing company in the communications equipment industry both in the US and globally. It was the only US company to make it into the global top 10.

Johnson & Johnson also made an appearance in the US top 10. Though it dropped three spots on Newsweek’s global ranking to 22 for 2017, Johnson & Johnson rose in the US rankings to the number 10 spot. The consumer goods company achieved a green score of 68.1 percent, with its strengths lying in its energy (88.7 percent) and carbon (82.2 percent) productivity performance. Johnson & Johnson recently featured on the Fortune’s Change the World List and JUST Capital’s JUST 100 List.

Other SB members recognized by Newsweek include BASF (72nd global), Humana (18th US, 32nd global), Hershey (21st US), CVS Health Corp (39th US, 62nd global), Ford (49th US, 79th global), LG Electronics (23rd global) and Target (114th US, 232nd global). Of these companies, four were recognized as best-in-category globally: BASF (Chemicals), Humana (Health Care Providers & Services), CVS (Food & Staples Retailing), and Target (Multiline Retail).

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