Unilever Sustainable Living Plan Progress Report 2011

34 Unilever Sustainable Living Plan Progress Report 2011
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OUR COMMITMENT
oUr aPProach
Unilever generates wealth and creates jobs in
the communities where it operates. Employees,
governments, suppliers, investors and many
others benefit economically from our activities.
The nature of our business in developing
and emerging markets means that we work
with millions of small-scale businesses. The
majority are smallholder farmers and smallscale
distributors who sell our products. Most
smallholder farmers grow their crops on less
than two hectares of land. They make up 85% of
the world’s farmers. often cut off from access to
training and education, they lack knowledge of
the techniques that would help them maximise
their incomes. If we help smallholder farmers
improve their practices, by giving them access
to higher-quality seeds, training and fertilisers,
they can often double or even triple their yields.
Unilever has been piloting a number of
initiatives with smallholder farmers to scale
up certification and connect new sources of
raw materials from smallholders into our
supply chain.
At the other end of the value chain our products
reach consumers through a network of millions
of small-scale retailers and distributors. This
makes a significant contribution to our business.
These activities provide new sources of income
for people who live in areas where opportunities
for work are often few and far between.
By 2020 we will engage with at least 500,000 smallholder farmers and
75,000 small-scale distributors in our supply network.
OUR PERFORMANCE
We have revised our target on smallholder farmers
to focus on improving the quality of their livelihoods.
As far as small-scale distributors are concerned,
we engaged with 45,000 in India in 2011.
l 0 AcHIEVED l 2 on-PLAn l 0 oFF-PLAn l 0 MISSED
WHAT MATTERS MOST
Engaging smallholder farmers in our supply network.