Nestlé in society Creating Shared Value and meeting our commitments 2015

Nestlé in society:
Creating Shared Value
Nutrition, health
and wellness Rural development Water
Environmental
sustainability
Human rights
and compliance
Our
people
G4-EC2, Energy G4-DMA, Biodiversity G4-DMA, G4-EN12, G4-EN13, G4-EN14, Emissions G4-DMA
We are already seeing the consequences of climate
change. Food production will come under increased
pressure in the future. This is why Europe’s food and
drink manufacturers are actively working to try to
mitigate and adapt to climate change through actions
such as investing in low-carbon technologies,
working with farmers and proactively engaging with
consumers and partners along the supply chain.”
Pascal Gréverath, Assistant Vice-President –
Environmental Sustainability, Nestlé; Chair of
FoodDrinkEurope’s Environmental
Sustainability Committee
Protecting and enhancing biodiversity
Nestlé depends on biodiversity in many ways, but especially
for the raw materials we source from farms, forests and
oceans. We are committed to managing our operations in a
way that safeguards all natural capital but particularly forests,
high conservation value areas, soils and water.
Our approach
Our commitment
Preserve natural capital, including forests
Natural capital is the sum total of nature’s resources and
services, and it is the basis upon which economic activity is
built. We procure a large range of raw materials from farms
and forests, and recognise our long-term success depends on
the products and services provided by natural capital.
We also know agricultural and forestry practices are a major
contributor to the loss of natural capital – particularly through
the conversion of natural habitats, overuse of chemicals and
water, and degradation of soil – so we aim to develop our
business in a way that safeguards it.
In our Nestlé Commitment on Natural Capital, we explicitly
commit to act as a responsible steward of natural capital,
focusing on water, deforestation, soil management and
biodiversity 10 . We will continue to report on risks and
responses; support consumers to make more informed
choices; and work collaboratively with stakeholders at
community and landscape levels.
Assessing our priorities
In our approach to natural capital, we understand both our
dependency and impact on biodiversity and ecosystem
services. Illustrating the scale of this challenge, we have
estimated that Nestlé is dependent upon an area of land
approximately equivalent to about two-and-a-half times the
area of Switzerland for producing the commodities we use.
Putting a value on the impact our business has can help us
understand and define the best way to reduce those impacts,
and make better business decisions. This may be through
corporate investment or, for broader impacts we have in
common with others, regulatory or governmental intervention.
We have also compiled a list of priority issues and
dependencies, drawing from a wide range of research from
organisations such as the International Union for Conservation
of Nature (IUCN), FAO, the Convention on Biological Diversity,
UNEP and the WWF. Understanding our dependencies on
biodiversity in this way helps us decide where best to focus
our activities.
We use a number of sources of guidance, both internal and
external, to guide our operations and those of our suppliers,
some of which are outlined below.
• We have produced detailed requirements for water use in
agriculture that are used in our RSG to improve water
stewardship at the farm level;
• We have published a paper on soil health and shared it
throughout our direct sourcing network. Soil health plays a
vital role in food production and food security. As we
purchase nearly 1% of the world’s agricultural output, we
are significantly affected by unsustainable agricultural
practices that contribute to the degradation of agricultural
soils through erosion, loss of organic matter, nutrient
depletion, contamination and increased salinity; and
• To help prioritise our interventions, we use Global Forest
Watch, an online mapping application that provides data
about forest degradation and deforestation worldwide.
We believe we can have the greatest positive impact in three
key areas – sourcing raw materials, improving the performance
of our factories and supporting public policy – as outlined over
the following pages.
10 Defined by the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversitys ‘the variability among
living organisms at ecosystem, species and genetic levels.’
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