We’re helping a growing number of key suppliers to build their capacity to reduce emissions. Leaders from two packaging businesses, one plastic, one aluminium, share their experiences of our Supplier Climate Programme.
We aim to have around 300 suppliers in our Supplier Climate Programme by the end of 2024
Partners will have shared their Product Carbon Footprint (PCF) data points with Unilever by the end of September
Emissions from raw materials, ingredients and packaging contributed approximately 63% of our greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in 2023
Three years after the launch of our Supplier Climate Programme, a growing number of businesses within our supply chain are accelerating their climate action.
We are focusing our support on a subset of key suppliers whose materials contribute the most to our climate impact: around 300 suppliers that are equal to approximately 44% of our ‘Scope 3’ GHG emissions (outside our operations and within scope of our net zero ambition) that are related to raw materials, ingredients and packaging.[a] These suppliers come from a range of industries including palm/oleochemicals, fine chemicals, soft commodities, food ingredients, packaging and petrochemicals, as well as collaborative manufacturers who produce some Unilever products on our behalf.
Our updated Climate Transition Action Plan (CTAP) estimates that our Supplier Climate Programme could deliver the biggest step towards reaching our new science-based targets for reducing our Scope 3 GHG emissions by 2030.
With 63% of our total emissions within scope of our net zero ambition estimated to come from our raw materials, ingredients and packaging,[b] helping suppliers to calculate and share the footprint of the materials they’re selling to us is key – we each need it to better understand our climate impact, collaborate over effective action and track progress over the next few years.
Our Supplier Climate Programme in action
Weener Plastics and Ball Corporation are among the companies taking part in our Supplier Climate Programme. Both supply Unilever with packaging solutions.
Last year, we provided guidance and tools to Weener Plastics to start calculating their PCF data for the first time, and they shared this with Unilever. Ball Corporation also shared its PCF data via a joint decarbonisation workshop. This year, we have engaged both companies again to share their updated PCF data, enabling us to track the progress they are making with reducing the climate impact of their materials.
Here, they explain how taking part in the Programme and recognising the business case for climate action is helping them to accelerate efforts in their own supply chains.
Weener Plastics
“Sustainability was already high on our agenda when we joined the Programme, but we didn’t have much experience of making footprint calculations ourselves, so being offered a pre-selected tool to use was helpful.
Now we’re training our teams using the PCF calculations we’ve made. It helps our developers design products in the best way and enables our operational teams to focus on the most relevant emission-reduction plans.
We know some changes will require more time or larger investments because the biggest reductions can often only be achieved by redesigning the entire product and its processes. However, we’ve already made operational savings since the start of the Supplier Climate Programme, from reducing scrap rates to optimising our cooling systems and processes.
We’ve also used the Programme as leverage to engage our own suppliers regarding missing emissions data. Large customers wanting to see progress on emissions helps to emphasise the importance of data availability.”
Lenny Ellenkamp-van Olst, Director of Sustainability at Weener Plastics
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