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Sustainability

Sustainability is about 'achieving a better quality of life for everyone, now and for future generations to come'. The environment is a central facet of this.

Across the UK, our members are committed to making a significant contribution to improving the environment.

Working collectively, they are making solid progress on their five-fold ambition to:

Working collectively, FDF members are making solid progress on their Five-fold Ambition to:

• Achieve a 35% absolute reduction in CO₂ emissions by 2020 compared to 1990.

• Seek to send zero food and packaging waste to landfill at the latest by 2015 and make a significant contribution to WRAP's Courtauld Commitment 2 target to reduce product and packaging waste in the supply chain by 5% by end of 2012 against a 2009 baseline.

• Make a significant contribution to WRAP's work to reducing the carbon impact of packaging by 10% by 2012 against a 2009 baseline.

• Achieve significant reductions in water use to help reduce stress on the nation's water supplies and contribute to an industry-wide absolute target to reduce water use by 20% by 2020 compared to 2007.

• Embed environmental standards in their transport practices, including contracts with hauliers as they fall for renewal, to achieve fewer and friendlier food transport miles and make a contribution to IGD's Efficient Consumer Response UK Sustainable Distribution Initiative to save 80 million HGV miles over the period 2010-12 in the grocery sector.

We are also committed to measuring progress against each of our ambitions and publishing annual progress - see our progress report.

A key milestone already achieved was the launch of the Federation House Commitment on water efficiency best practice on 28 January 2008. The Commitment was jointly developed by FDF and Envirowise, the Government's expert body on water efficiency, to help FDF achieve its water saving ambition and to help the sector as a whole.

Member companies, with a combined turnover of £15 billion, were the very first to sign up to it.

In Scotland, our members are engaged and committed to making a difference in this area, and many have already delivered real progress.

See below some examples which give you real insight into what we are doing in Scotland:

• SFDF 5 fold Environmental Ambition Presentation (pdf, 328kb) to the Scottish Government Experts Group for the development of health and environmental sustainability framework.
• Macsween Sustainability Report - pdf | 1.85Mb
• Pinneys of Scotland (The Seafood Company) carried out an extensive environmental audit to identify areas for improvement in order to develop a carbon management programme. The company then set ambitious targets to drive it towards environmental excellence.
• Young's Seafood: After signing FDF's transport commitment in July 2008, Young's has been working hard with its haulier to prepare for the inclusion of the Greener Food Transport Clause in contracts.