The UK’s biggest supermarkets have joined forces to accelerate climate action through their supply chains.
Tesco, Marks and Spencer, Sainsbury’s Waitrose and the Co-op have all pledged to take action taking action to agree standards and reduce their environmental impact, which includes cutting down on packaging and waste.
The pledge comes as WWF announced its goal of halving the environmental impact of food shopping by 2030 as it warned there was an “urgent need for accelerated action”
In response to the report, the CEO’s of the UK’s biggest supermarkets announced they will be supporting suppliers to to adopt science-based targets to reach net-zero climate emissions by 2050.
Subscribe to Grocery Gazette for free
Sign up here to get the latest grocery and food news each morning
They have also agreed to work with the charity, Waste & Resources Action Programme (WRAP), to develop and deliver climate action programme for the grocery retail sector, focussing on high-impact actions to halve their climate emissions, by 2030.
In a joint statement, Shirine Khoury-Haq, CEO of Co-op Group, Stuart Machin, CEO M&S, Simon Roberts, Sainsbury’s CEO, Ken Murphy, Tesco CEO and James Bailey, Waitrose’s Executive Director said: “WWF’s findings leave no doubt of the scale of the task we collectively agreed to undertake when it comes to improving our food supply chains and enabling a sustainable shopping experience for our customers.
“We restate our commitment to work with WWF, our customers, suppliers, and the UK government to halve the environmental impact of UK shopping baskets by 2030. We believe that this goal is achievable and is vital for the future of nature, our planet, our businesses and, crucially, our customers.”
“As part of the acceleration of climate action announced today, the supermarkets are working, with WWF and WRAP the climate action NGO, through the Courtauld 2030 framework, to set targets and help their suppliers set targets and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”
