Sainsbury’s peer review identifies sustainability ‘gaps’

The retailer invited over 150 CSR leaders to conduct a brief pre-audit of its plan, as part of a wider peer review exercise, in a bid to refine its corporate sustainability agenda going forward.

The findings flagged up two areas – ‘building a sustainable supply chain’ and ‘engaging customers on sustainability’ – where Sainsbury’s could push for further efficiencies. These were demonstrated as having the biggest gaps between identified importance and ratings performance.

All the results from the pre-audit have been aggregated and will feed into a series of 12 closed roundtable discussions taking place tonight at a Green Mondays event in London.

A representative from Sainsbury’s will sit in on each discussion to debate the points in more depth. Topics will include: determining materiality, target setting, reporting, supply chain, customer engagement, carbon and energy, waste and the changing energy landscape.

Chief executive Justin King will also provide an update on progress against CSR and sustainability commitments over the past 12 months, and announce a new £1m fund aimed at kick starting the next wave of improvements to British farming.

Maxine Perella