Corporate Responsibility Revolution
Most of the 3500 people I was mingling with at the Global Landscapes Forum in Paris today were researchers and policy-makers, but we also heard from some companies. Danone, Mars and Firmenich (Swiss fragrance company) described activities that seem to me to represent a ”responsibility revolution.”
These ”revolutionary” activities are supportive partnerships along supply chains, including with the farmers on which the companies are ultimately dependent. In Sweden Saltå Kvarn does similar things, but for the multi-nationals, the farmers are a long, long way away, down complex supply chains.
Firmenich, for example, is helping smallholders improve yields of key ingredients such as vanilla and cardamom, whereas Danone is offsetting for the carbon emissions of some of its products ”from field to customer,” in exactly the same way as ZeroMission’s customers Max Hamburgers and Arvid Nordquist. For the CEO of Danone ”carbon offsetting is not an additional voluntary cost, it’s an essential investment.”
You could argue that looking after partners all along your supply chain is just enlightened self-interest, but whatever the motivation, it’s a stark contrast to the irresponsible trading of recent decades.
Carbon offsetting can be a relatively straightforward first step in implementing this extended responsibility. There are standardised methods of measuring emissions from supply chains, and high quality agroforestry and land-use offsets available. As our understanding and measurement of other negative impacts improves, then companies will be able to take full responsibility for these impacts too. Once the downstream impacts of products are also addressed, the ”responsibility revolution” will be complete.
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