Our partners
Beyond our direct emissions, our wider value chain shows greenhouse gas emissions at every stage of the value chain – including the sourcing, distribution, consumption and disposal of our products.
We are working with others to reduce our carbon footprint all along this chain.
Supply chain collaboration
We are founding members of the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) Supply Chain Leadership Collaboration. CDP aims to increase companies’ disclosure of their greenhouse gas (GHG) management plans and impacts and to encourage them to put reduction plans in place. CDP’s supplier programme has global reach and involves the collaboration of businesses within the supply chain.
We are promoting the involvement of suppliers of non-agriculturally based raw materials in the CDP as it represents a global standard approach for disclosure of GHG management plans and performance. We believe that involvement in the CDP is of intrinsic value to our suppliers and we encourage their participation.
Findings from the first-ever global collaboration on climate change between major companies and their suppliers demonstrated the need for increased supplier awareness of the regulatory, physical and general risks that climate change poses to their business. These findings were published in the Carbon Disclosure Project’s Supply Chain Report 2009 entitled ‘Shared value: Managing climate change in the supply chain’. See External links for this year's updated report.
Other reporting platforms exist and may be preferred by suppliers. Regardless of which platform is used, we expect the GHG agenda to become part of ‘business as usual’ with our suppliers, with the express intent that they undertake emission-reduction programmes and set ambitious targets to achieve them.
Working with farmers
In 2010 we launched the Cool Farm Tool, a calculator to help farmers reduce their carbon emissions on farms. The calculator is designed to be simple and practical to use, allowing farmers to make changes that will have an impact on reducing emissions. The Tool allows farmers to prioritise options by running different scenarios to see how much of an impact they make and also allows them to take account of management, livestock, field energy use and primary processing, such as in factory and in storage.
Developed by the Sustainable Food Laboratory, University of Aberdeen and Unilever, farmers’ assessment results are recorded in a central database at Aberdeen and then analysed. Unilever will be requiring all its suppliers using our Sustainable Agriculture Code or carrying out self-verification to either use the Cool Farm Tool themselves or provide the necessary data so that carbon footprints can be calculated.
Developing standards
In Europe, Unilever is part of the Green Power Market Development Group and we aim to accelerate the change to renewable energy sources, where possible, in our operations. We use this group to improve our understanding of the technical and economic feasibility of renewable energy options and to benchmark our methodology for reporting emissions from renewable energy sources.
Unilever also participates in the Greenhouse Gas Protocol Initiative, a partnership between the World Resources Institute and the World Business Council for Sustainable Development to develop standards on the measurement and reporting of greenhouse gas emissions. We have provided input in the development of the Product and Scope 3 Accounting Standard.
Unilever has participated in the Greenhouse Gas Working Group of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil. For further details on this initiative, see Sustainable palm oil.
Climate Savers Computing Initiative
We are members of the Climate Savers Computing Initiative, a partnership that brings together industry, government, conservation and consumer organisations in setting ambitious targets for energy-efficient computing. The Initiative’s goal was to reduce global CO2 emissions from computers by 49 million tonnes per year by 2010, which is equivalent to the annual emissions of 11 million cars or up to 20 coal-fired power stations. Together with other members of the Initiative, we are working to introduce more energy-efficient PCs and servers, raise awareness and increase the use of energy-saving features, such as automatic ‘sleep’ settings when computers are idle for long periods. See Green IT in Related links for more information.