The food producer now has ‘some of the most ambitious targets for reducing emissions amongst UK businesses’. Premier Foods set itself specific goals to reduce emissions from its own operations and from those it buys goods and services from by 2030.
The SBTi has recognised these are in line with international efforts to limit global temperature increases to 1.5 degrees, based on extensive mapping of greenhouse gas emissions for its operations and supply chain.
Nick Brown, ESG Director at Premier Foods said: “Climate change is the defining issue of our time. Effective action with the potential to change the course of temperature trends across the globe is only possible with rigorous scrutiny and measurement, which is why we wanted to work with the SBTi to get our own targets validated.
“We’ve put a lot of effort into analysing our greenhouse gas emissions and those of the firms we work with so it’s important that we know we’re on the right track, with targets which are meaningful and will contribute to worldwide efforts. This validation gives us an important platform from which to take the next steps of our journey towards net zero.”
Key highlights of progress:
- Product: sales value of products meeting high nutritional standards has grown by 17% and plant-based products by 34%
- Planet: food waste in own operations was reduced by 11%
- People: 47% of general management roles and 40% of senior management roles are held by females, both up from a year ago.