“We have set ourselves a bold ambition because we understand that we urgently need to reduce our impact on the planet and help to drive change across our industry,” said Mike Coupe, then Sainsbury’s chief executive, 2019. He was speaking after the chain had committed to reduce plastic packaging by 50% by 2025.
It could however have been any supermarket boss talking about any planet-related promise. Indeed, this is straight from the corporate playbook on making public promises: say it’s “bold”, note that it is an “ambition” (or aspiration; a bit like politicians who say “we are working towards…”), and that it’s not just about ‘us’ (just in case we fail).
And fail they have. Spectacularly. A new investigation by the NGOs Feedback and The Food Foundation shows that a decade’s worth of commitments – 600 of them in total – on climate and environment by the UK’s 10 largest supermarkets are “failing to translate to sufficient progress or public transparency”.
The targets are inconsistent, goalposts can be moved and the wording can be edited (to increase the chances of hitting a target, for example). Reporting is also irregular and abstruse.
Consider for example the crucial commitments on net-zero. The final deadlines are often way off into the future – 2040 or 2050 – but to have any chance of getting there (and keeping global temperatures in check) dramatic reductions in greenhouse gas emissions are essential in the short-term (about 50% by 2030). You wouldn’t bet your house on their chances of success, but read the reports and updates and you’d be forgiven for thinking everything is under control.
Tesco has for example just published its latest sustainability report for 2024/25. The website page hosting the document has some of the ‘progress’ in big, bold numbers. The one relating to climate is “65% – the reduction in emissions from our operations, exceeding our target of 60%”. Sounds great, doesn’t it?
However, operational emissions – or in net-zero parlance, scope 1 and 2 emissions – account for 1.12% of the chain’s total emissions. That’s about 820,000tCO2e of 73,200,000tCO2e, according to the company’s 2023/24 figures. So how about those other 72,380,160tCO2e – or so-called scope 3 emissions, most of which come from the food and drink the company sells?
Well, the 2024/25 report doesn’t show that; nor does the chief executive Ken Murphy mention it in his foreword. He sticks to that 65% reduction in scopes 1 and 2 (which others do in their reports; others steer clear of climate altogether because their emissions have been increasing).
Feedback and The Food Foundation found 84 commitments on net-zero and emissions made by the 10 largest supermarkets here. Progress was reported on scope 1 and 2 emissions far more than on scope 3. It’s worth noting that scope 3 emissions which stretch up and down the supermarket supply chain are much, much trickier to measure – but companies by and large know where the big sources are: agriculture, and in particular dairy and meat. Tesco has improved its understanding of these emissions but is yet to do anything meaningful to reduce them: farmers need help – including expertise and cash – if they’re going to reduce their own carbon footprints (which are Tesco’s scope 3), and considerably.
Tesco’s total emissions have actually fallen. Just. By 0.1%. This is a supermarket that has set a target to cut its scope 3 emissions by 55% by 2032. Those linked to farming and land need to fall by 39.4%. So, millions of tonnes rather than the thousands being cut currently.
The momentum on climate and nature in the past decade has snowballed, but progress has fallen far short of the promises (and PR). “The UK cannot rely on voluntary corporate commitments alone to meet its climate targets,” warned the NGOs in their report.
We rely on corporate altruism and chief executive hyperbole at our peril – especially in an era when politicians have been all talk and no teeth on climate too.
I am the last person to stand up and defend governments and corporates, but there is a logical reason for this inaction. Us!
A couple of years ago I sat on the Climate Change Committee business advisory group. It consisted largely of heads of sustainability departments of the corporates. This was these people’s daily bread, and initially they spoke passionately about their employers’ plans for transitioning to ‘net zero’. But, as time went on it became apparent that little was going to happen due to ‘first mover disadvantage’. Basically the fear was that any significant move to reduce emissions would come at a cost making their products more expensive and giving competitors a price advantage. Or if they maintained their prices this would result in reduced profits and a drop in the share price. That was a red line.
What they were asking was that government set targets and time scales, putting everyone on an equal footing.
Around the same time I attended a Helen McArthur Foundation event at the London Roundhouse. There were several hundred business people there listening to talks about the environment, waste, etc. At one point the compere asked the audience to vote on a question, which was, ‘What would you prefer? That the transition to net zero be driven by the market, or by legislation. These were business people remember. I was astounded that 95% of the vote went for ‘legislation’.
Now, I think it fair to say that any government, no matter what they might say, know full well that if the transition to net zero hits us in our pockets, or lifestyles, we will assuredly vote them out of office!
So there we have it. A stalemate, and we are the problem.
A lot of people talk about degrowth, but my question is ‘how?’, because degrowth would mean a complete collapse of our current financial markets and rules, meaning everyones wealth was turned upside down… What happens then and how do we manage the fall out of that on top of everything else? I agree on the stalemate. No-one wants to make the move til the public understand that this is serious now, we need to change the world more dramatically than when we did for either world war, this is more threatening to all life than any world war…
Certainly the odds are stacked against us Alice, but it is possible. It will require leadership, vision and co-operation. But, as David Attenborough says in his powerful new documentary, we have done it before, for the whales, for ozone, and we can do it again. It is not about degrowth so much as re-setting our value system to incorporate our short and long-term impacts on the environment and wider society. It’s about carefully formulating a cross-sectoral, long term plan for transitioning our systems to an holistic, sustainable model. It’s about keeping everyone informed and on side. We know how to do it.
I’m just a farmer, so what do I know? Well. we set out on our agroecological journey over 25 years ago. We have seen the audited farm biodiversity (which was pretty good when we started) grow by 50%. We are one of the few independently assessed net zero dairy farms in Europe. We don’t use any herbicides or fertilisers, yet our pasture yields are now every bit as good as they were when we did, thanks to the recovery of our soil microbiome. By leaving our dairy calves with their mums, we have seen their health and productivity increase substantially. We really don’t buy much stuff any more which makes us relatively immune to global price spikes. And, you know, the guys who work here are here because of what we are doing. They feel good about it, and that is rare in the dairy industry. And yes, it is profitable. It can be done!
To David Finlay’s shrewd observations I would add that changing popular behaviour, as opposed to attitudes, calls for more than charismatic leadership, vital though that is. I’m afraid state intervention is also required; taxing and subsidising the “bad” and “good” behaviours works, and fast, where exhortation often fails. What’s more, attitudes often change as a result, even if there may be a lag.