Safety and health at work

People are at the heart of our business so taking care of our employees, business partners and the communities we operate in is extremely important.

A safe and healthy workplace is a crucial component of a fair and ethical food industry – one that has a positive impact and creates a motivated workforce. We carefully tailor the occupational health and safety measures we put in place to the specific needs and requirements of local industries and workers.

Setting high standards for health and safety

With many of our employees working in factories and production facilities where health and safety is critically important, we take a proactive approach to preventing accidents, eliminating risks and promoting safe behaviors. We have a ‘zero-harm’ vision and expect the most serious rules – to prevent serious injuries or fatalities – to be applied with zero tolerance. We empower employees to stop work and speak up if they encounter an unsafe scenario. Beyond our operations, we have created programs encouraging safe behaviors among children, such as crossing roads.

Our key actions

• Continue strengthening our safety culture toward zero harm, with people at the center of everything we do
• Deliver against the milestones from the Nestlé Roadmap for Employee Health, to inspire and empower our people to choose a healthier life
• Strengthen direct suppliers' capacity to uphold Nestlé's requirements on OHS as part of our Supplier Human Rights and Environmental Due Diligence (HREDD) Assurance Framework
• Engage and support prioritized direct suppliers in taking actions to address OHS risks and impacts in their own operations and supply chains
• Collaborate with peers and stakeholders to help address systemic issues and develop common approaches and tools for safety and health
• Support access to remedy via safe and effective grievance mechanisms for our employees and workers affected by our operations, business relationships and agricultural supply chains

Enhancing mental well-being

To tackle mental health challenges – including stress and poor-quality sleep – we provide guidance and advice to employees through webinars, online content, participation in campaigns such as #HealthyLives and Mental Health Week and promoting taking active breaks. With homeworking now well-established, we have now formalized a hybrid, flexible working policy in all markets and introduced programs encouraging homeworkers to take breaks or practice mindfulness.

In some markets, we have trained people to become qualified Mental Health First Aiders. They are on hand to support anyone experiencing emotional or mental health issues, whether work-related or personal. We support the charity Mind to offer our people the best support and tools to promote mental well-being across our entire workforce.

Safer working conditions at sea

In Thailand, where we source up to 7% of our seafood, we have explored how to improve safety on fishing vessels. In a collaboration with the non-profit organization Verité and our seafood supplier Thai Union, we funded and developed a demonstration vessel demonstrating how mechanization to deploy and retrieve nets could improve worker safety and reduce overcrowding on board.

Creating a culture of safety

In our factories, we have introduced new working practices that refocus the working environment around well-being. Within our global operations, we audit all our facilities for compliance with our sustainability and human rights requirements across seven pillars, including Safety and Health, Environmental Sustainability, Conditions of Work and Employment, Local Communities and Labor Accommodation, as well as, Business Integrity and Security. We use digital data and behavioral science to anticipate problems and tackle the root causes of risky behaviors.