Kroger, the nation’s largest traditional grocery retailer, has announced significant improvements to its seafood buying practices and standards.
Working in partnership with WWF, Kroger says by 2015, it wants to source 100 percent of its top 20 wild-caught species from sources that are certified by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC), in full assessment, or involved in a Fishery Improvement Project with WWF.
In addition, Kroger will:
Worldwide demand for palm oil is enormous. According to the WWF, palm oil can now be found in about half of the packaged supermarket products that consumers buy every day. Plus, it’s increasingly used as a biofuel.
Unfortunately, though, researchers estimate that only six percent of the current global supply of palm oil is sustainably grown. As it stands now, the vast majority of palm oil production is driving large-scale destruction of rainforests across southeast Asia. (See this Greenpeace report for more details about the critical importance of sustainable palm oil production.)
Fortunately, a handful of food manufacturers recognize the devastating environmental impact of current palm oil production methods, and they are beginning to take action.
Earlier this month, Kellogg Company has announced that it wants to become a leader in this area, too. The company says it wants to purchase sustainable palm oil –but that can only happen if a segregated palm oil supply is available that is financially and logistically feasible. In the meantime, Kellogg will help fund sustainable palm oil production through purchasing GreenPalm certificates covering 100 percent of its global palm oil use. Kellogg is the first in the US food industry to take this step.
The company is also: (more…)
Every year since 1999, the US State Department has recognized US businesses that demonstrate good corporate citizenship abroad. As good global citizens, these corporations have a positive impact on American foreign relations.
This year, the annual Award for Corporate Excellence (ACE) was given to Mars, Incorporated for its work in cocoa sustainability and its various efforts to improve economic development in the cocoa-growing region of the Republic of Ghana.
Mars was chosen from a record number of 78 nominations submitted by American ambassadors around the world, and according to Mars, the ACE award reflects the company’s evolving commitment to cocoa sustainability. To illustrate this commitment, Mars points out that it has pledged to use 100 percent certified sustainable cocoa in all of its products worldwide by 2020. In addition, Mars, IBM and the US Department of Agriculture unveiled the preliminary cacao genome sequence in September 2010 – three years ahead of schedule – and made it public to help improve traditional breeding programs and ultimately bolster production to benefit millions of farmers worldwide.
Cocoa, one of the top ten global agricultural commodities, is a crucial crop for the economies of many developing nations and often accounts for a major portion of their GDPs. Globally, approximately 6.5 million farmers –most on small, family-run farms –depend on cocoa for their livelihoods, but unfortunately, cocoa is hundreds of years behind most modern crops in terms of breeding selection cycles. As a result, plants are vulnerable to pests and diseases, leading to serious losses for farmers –and significant disruptions to global supply chains.
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Earlier this month, the Hershey Company released its first corporate social responsibility report, a 62-page online document that outlines the company’s CSR priorities and establishes measurable goals for future progress.
Specifically, Hershey groups the company’s priorities and programs into four areas –Marketplace, Environment, Workplace and Community –and here are a few recent highlights regarding environmental stewardship. The company has: (more…)
Tyson Foods, Inc., has released its third sustainability report, titled “Rooted in Tradition. Growing Responsibly.” The report, which is only available online, highlights progress the company has made on a wide range of social, environmental and economic goals in its US operations for fiscal 2008 and 2009.
