Investors, companies, consumers, and other stakeholders have all seemingly agreed—it’s time to get real about sustainability. Amid the post-pandemic confusion and evolving regulations around this topic, though, we’ve heard uncertainty echoed across the food industry. The need for an up-to-date ESG survival guide is palpable.
If you’re looking for ways to integrate environmental, social, and governance considerations on the ground—or the plant—floor, we’re examining everything from the backlash against greenwashing to evolving traceability requirements around sustainable documentation, practices, suppliers, etc. In addition to recapping sustainability’s role in food and beverage over the past few years, we cover its future impact for the remainder of 2024 and beyond.
A closer look at policies in the US and UK
In the wake of Brexit, an interesting relationship between the UK and EU has emerged with regard to ESG regulations, policies, and business practices. Although it was intended to “free” the country from contentious compliance matters, the EU remains its largest trading partner. Effectively forcing F&B manufacturers to maintain alignment with EU policies in many ways.
But for brands who operate internationally—or use suppliers that do—there are conflicting guidelines throughout the United States to watch as well. While we won’t go into too much detail here, you can inspect to find more on the following topics in this guide:
- Increasing ESG transparency with stakeholders, regulators, consumers, and employees
- Addressing risks to the industry’s reputation and profits, including labor-related deficiencies
- Maintaining compliance with applicable regulations in a global supply chain
- Four trends that have the potential to redefine ESG practices for the foreseeable future
- How brands can future-proof their businesses with a data management overhaul
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A uniquely F&B perspective
In this industry, we have our own language, processes, legislation, and more. Shouldn’t we have our own unique approach to ESG? Especially since brands have faced increased scrutiny on deforestation, water usage, forced labor, etc. over the past year.
It’s time to take action on sustainability and get out of survival mode. And the first step is downloading a guide created specifically for the food and beverage industry by those who know it best. Keep reading for your first look at this new resource.
A Sneak Preview: Chapter 1
ESG: An Evolving Story
The last two years may go down in history as the era in which many global businesses started to “get real” about sustainability. Coming out of the COVID pandemic, a major theme was the rapid growth of ESG-themed investment worldwide. But recently, that wave of investment has crested, and even receded in some sectors. One big reason for that has been a substantial, global pushback against “greenwashing,” loosely defined as the practice of putting a good face on sustainability while doing little, in real terms, to support environmental and social goals.
Investors, companies, consumers and ultimately regulators have aligned around the need to ensure that sustainability is being pursued on the ground, in real terms, rather than through complicated credit schemes and financial engineering that yields little in concrete value.
In addition, and as we’ll discuss later, political pushback has ratcheted up, particularly in the US. Against a backdrop of substantial political polarization in the United States, individual states have enacted legislation to limit the ability of certain entities to invest in ESG-themed funds. The emergence of ESG as a point of political contention has added to a growing, US-based trend of states going their own way on key industry issues.
At the same time, however, the European Union and the UK have continued to push forward with fairly aggressive sustainability legislation. As we’ll cover, regulations covering carbon reporting, deforestation, forced labor and more continue to move forward in Europe.
On the one hand, these divergent trends between regions create a complicated picture for global brands. At the same time, however, global sustainability regulations are increasingly creating definite and actionable frameworks for compliance, bringing the work of sustainability down to earth for many brands and manufacturers.
Let’s take a look at the rapidly evolving world of ESG in 2024, and discuss how you can future-proof your operations as we look out over the years to come. Let’s begin with a refresher on just what lies behind the acronym.
More on the progress we’ve already made
If you’re doing a deep dive on this topic, we’ve got more resources to share. Specifically, The 2023 Food Industry ESG Survival Guide, which includes more information on all things environment, social, and governance. Including its origins as an investment strategy and the evolution led to more recent consumer demand and legislation.
