Winner — Watercare: Woolworths
Calculating your business blueprint in the face of South Africa’s potential water crisis is becoming more of a necessity than a luxury.
With South Africa’s water drying up, calculating the water footprint of each of your products has become critical. And the challenge is to reduce that footprint. Taking a lead with this initiative is Woolworths. The company is aiming for a 30% reduction in water consumption and has committed itself to developing a programme to encourage its suppliers to do the same.
‘At least 60% of the country’s water resource is used in farming irrigation and Woolworths is deeply committed to preserving this precious resource. We have a long history of working with our suppliers to influence change and believe in working together to manage our environmental impacts responsibly,” said Justin Smith, Woolworths good business journey manager.
He said water consumption at Woolworths head office had been reduced by 13% and stores by 5% over the past year. ‘This is significant, not only for conservation but also as proof that sustainability can deliver cost savings, which can be added to the bottom line.”
The company’s commitment to preserve water resources and use water responsibly is inspired by the Woolworths good business journey — an ongoing plan to make a difference in our communities, our country and our world.
‘It is becoming increasingly obvious that sustainable growth can only be achieved through paying greater attention to the world around us than has been the case in the past,” said Simon Susman, the CEO of Woolworths. ‘The launch of the Woolworths good business journey marks a change in the way we will operate going forward, ensuring that we drive that virtuous circle that will benefit all of our stakeholders.”
The good business journey is a five-year plan, changing the way Woolworths does business, said Susman. It incorporates a series of challenging targets and commitments, centred on four key priorities: accelerating transformation, driving social development, enhancing the company’s environmental focus and addressing climate change.
Some of the commitments included opening a trial carbonneutral store and reducing its relative carbon footprint by 30%. But it was Woolworth’s commitment to lessening their water footprint that won them the Greening the Future award.
Woolworths was the first retailer to join the World Wide Fund for Nature’s (WWF) water neutral scheme. The scheme, launched last year in association with the government’s Working for Water programme, seeks to encourage corporates to become ‘water neutral”.
Woolworths also aims to become water neutral by eliminating invasive water-thirsty alien plants on supplier farms and in protected areas such as the Tankwa Karoo National Park.
The project will release enough water into South Africa’s water system to offset the water used by Woolworths operations each year. This offsets Woolworths’ direct use of water resources, ultimately making the company water neutral as well as creating employment.
The project is a 20-year commitment. With its emphasis on organically grown produce, Woolworths says growing food without artificial chemicals such as herbicides and pesticides does not release potentially harmful chemicals into water supplies.
Apart from the organic farmers, Woolworths also encourages conventional farmers to help them incorporate biological farming practices into the way they work. The project Farming for the Future seeks to establish a sustainable microbial population in the soil and the use of water is important for this.
The company also measures the amount of water used by suppliers and works with them to reduce water use and improve waste water management during growing, production and manufacture. Within the foods unit, this work includes the reduction of pesticides, fertilisers and water usage for irrigation.
Woolworths has entrenched a strict code of conduct regarding dyes in the supply chain, which preserves water quality. It also works with the CSIR to identify South African arable areas that are likely to struggle with water scarcity because of the effects of climate change and to incorporate this thinking into its supply chain strategy.
The company is committed to water conservation education. Woolworths delivers talks at learning institutions, works to educate its supply chain and provides water savings tips and advice to customers and employees.
Deon Nel, head of the WWF Living Waters Partnership, said it applauded Woolworths for its water neutrality strategy. He said the WWF believed that the company was a global example of how corporate South Africa could work with government and NGOs to find a solution that would benefit business, the environment and the country.