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Our approach to sustainably produced raw materials
At the heart of good food is the quality of the ingredients, the soils and ecosystems in which they are grown, and the conditions of the people who produce them.
Building on years of work with suppliers and farmers to source key ingredients that are traceable and responsibly sourced, we have developed and refined a new Produced Sustainably Framework.
Our progress toward sustainably produced raw materials
22
%
100
%
71.7
%
Encouraging sustainable production
Our approach to sustainable sourcing aims to help build the foundations to advance regenerative food systems at scale. We believe it can help transform agricultural production practices in a way that has a positive impact on people, nature and climate.
Our ‘Produced Sustainably’ framework applies to 14 key ingredients, representing 95% of our annual sourcing by volume. These include: cereals and grains; cocoa; coconut; coffee; dairy; fish and seafood; hazelnuts; meat, poultry and eggs; palm oil; pulp and paper; soy; spices; sugar; and vegetables.
The framework’s main KPI measures the performance of volumes at origin level against the requirements of our Responsible Sourcing Standard. In our 2022 reporting, a material is produced sustainably either when it can be traced to low-risk countries or when it has been assessed as compliant with our Responsible Sourcing Standard through one of the following means:
- Certification
- Second or third-party farm assessments
- On-the-ground programs in which Nestlé directly works with producers (e.g., Nestlé Cocoa Plan, Nescafé Plan or Nespresso AAA Sustainable Quality™ Program).
From 2025, we will also assess suppliers’ Human Rights and Environmental Due Diligence – taking into account their systems, processes and progress in improving these areas.
Our Responsible Sourcing Standard
‘Produced Sustainably’ builds on our Responsible Sourcing Standard, which sets out basic non-negotiable standards and important sustainability practices that we ask our suppliers and their employees, agents and subcontractors to respect and adhere to at all times when conducting business with us.
The four key pillars to our approach
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Environment We have evolved our strategy from managing deforestation risks in our supply chain to making a positive impact on the critical landscapes we source from. Among other targets, we aim for our primary supply chains for coffee and cocoa to be assessed deforestation-free by 2025. We remain focused on achieving and maintaining assessed deforestation-free status for meat, palm oil, pulp and paper, soy and sugar, where we have already made great progress. We also aim to grow 200 million trees by 2030 as part of 15 landscape-level initiatives around the world.
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Human rights We are committed to raising awareness, promoting best practices and empowering people across our value chain, including our operations and supply chains. We want to help create a more resilient and fair future for everyone – from farmers and their families to employees and consumers. Our commitments, laid out in our Human Rights Framework and Roadmap, and our actions, set out in our salient issue action plans, are key to enabling a just transition to a regenerative food system. We will use our scale and resources to identify and address risks across our business.
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Animal welfare We want the animals in our supply chains for relevant commodities to be treated with dignity and kept healthy. We have rapidly expanded our procurement of cage-free eggs: 100% of our eggs are already certified cage-free in the United States and Europe and we are working toward 100% cage-free eggs globally by 2025.
In dairy, we use advanced sensors and monitoring techniques to check the well-being of the cattle providing our milk. Introducing more varied pastures allows cows to graze outdoors for longer periods of the year.
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Transparency We are committed to transparency. Improving traceability of the origins of our raw materials and understanding how they are produced is an important element of our sustainable sourcing practices. Gaining visibility into our supply chain enhances our ability to monitor and improve suppliers' environmental and social practices.
