This week, Walmart released its third sustainability report. Since Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and our team in Bentonville, Arkansas, works daily with Walmart, we want to share our thoughts on the environmental portion of the report. Because we don’t take money from Walmart – or any of our corporate partners – we can be candid about what’s working and what’s not.
This is our fifth year working with Walmart, and throughout that time we’ve been pushing the company hard to take aggressive goals and to be transparent about its results – clearly disclosing progress and the data to back it up. With this report, it is evident that the message is starting to sink in.
The report gives a complete accounting of all of the sustainability goals to which Walmart has committed, with a detailed progress update for each. The sheer number and scope of the goals is notable, as is the actual progress that the company has made on most of them. To be honest, I find it even more impressive that Walmart is also candid about where they are falling short of a goal. Most companies I know don’t want to talk about what’s not working. But taking risks and setting high goals is what we need more of – it’s the only way to achieve transformational environmental change. And in the context of progress on many other fronts, a struggle here or there seems just about right.
One great move forward since last year is Walmart’s new climate goal to reduce 20 million metric tons of carbon pollution from its products’ lifecycle and supply chain over the next five years. This fills the biggest hole in the scope of the sustainability program.
But there are some areas in the report, and in Walmart’s program, that still need improvement:
- Avoiding waste. Walmart likes to talk about waste being redirected from landfills, but it should also focus on avoiding waste in the first place and reporting on that. Now that a good tracking system for waste is in place, we’d like to see a report of the total volume of waste produced annually, and the change in total volume from 2008 to 2009. We’d like to know whether Walmart’s waste reduction and diversion efforts are actually resulting in a net reduction from one year to the next.
- Progress on packaging is lagging. The report gives data on the number of items represented in a packaging scorecard. That would have been fine a couple of years ago, but we should be able to see an actual baseline by now. It also mentions the goal of “packaging neutral,” which is never defined. For these goals to be meaningful, Walmart needs to define the metrics by which it will measure progress. While we’ve heard many anecdotes about packaging reductions at Walmart, for now we have no way of knowing if net progress is actually being made.
- Reporting progress in context. The report on phosphates (an excellent attempt, by the way, to improve water quality in the Americas) gives progress on only a small portion of the goal and lacks a baseline (defined in last year’s report as the total mass of phosphates sold in 2009). As such, it is really meaningless. Knowing that 29% of detergent is phosphate free in Central America sounds good, but it is a relatively tiny percentage of the entire Americas, and who knows whether that represents a change driven by Walmart.
From what we see on the ground, Walmart is indeed working hard to “broaden and accelerate” their sustainability efforts, as CEO Mike Duke says. The folks working on this at Walmart have taken to proudly wearing buttons emblazoned with a “37” representing the number of Walmart sustainability goals (though there are actually 38 with the new climate goal added in). It’s a symbol of how intently they are focused on moving forward to meet those goals.
4 Comments
What is EDF's position on Wal-Mart's $27 million settlement over charges it violated environmental laws in California? According to the Los Angeles Times, "Among the materials being improperly transported, stored and dumped were pesticides, chemicals, paint, acid, aerosols, fertilizer and motor oil." Children were also placed directly at risk – again, quoting the Times, "The case began when an investigator from the San Diego County Department of Environmental Health spotted a Wal-Mart employee dumping bleach down a drain. In Solano County in Northern California, a child was found playing in a fertilizer pile left near his home." None of Wal-Mart's corporate "sustainability" matters if they are illegal dumping their waste and putting the public directly in danger.
Walmart entered into to a consent decree with state authorities in California related to mishandling of hazardous waste. The materials the LA Times mentions, even though they are sold by Walmart as consumer products, are hazardous waste when they are returned by customers. Walmart employees were improperly disposing of these products (unlike you and I, Walmart- as a regulated entity cannot simply throw these items out in the trash) and were transporting them to Walmart return centers in regular Walmart trucks instead of special hazardous waste transporters. Clearly Walmart broke the law, and Cal/EPA has done its job to identify and resolve the problems. Walmart bears full responsibility for complying with local, state and federal environmental laws. If you'd like to know more about what Walmart has done in response you can read their press release. Admittedly it's heavy on the press-speak and light on the details but you can get a sense of the program that they've implemented in response to the lawsuits.
At the same time, in our work with Walmart we've seen them (perhaps as a result of this lawsuit) turn their attention to working with suppliers to reduce the chemicals of concern present in common household products. See our blog post about that work. EDF has engaged with Walmart in an effort to better understand the hazardous components of the products it sells, with the aim of replacing those components with greener alternatives over time. The screening tool we worked together on is just the first step. Now we're working together on the harder step of trying to reduce and eliminate chemicals of concern present in the products on Walmart's shelves.
Does this screening tool you mention above apply to the toxic levels of cadmium found in children's and costume jewelry? Long-term exposure to cadmium can lead to bone softening and kidney failure. It is also a known carcinogen, and research suggests that it can, like lead, hinder brain development in the very young. Concerns come when youngsters bite or suck on the jewelry, as many children are apt to do. According to the Associated Press, WalMart knew of presence of cadmium in their products as early as February of this year, but moved to take the Miley Cyrus jewelry (targeting young girls) three months later, in May, only after the AP raised the issue in the public. Along with the earlier practices of toxic dumping, its easy to see a WalMart pattern of abuse and carelessness about exposure of costumers to toxic materials in products, rather than a corporate concern with long-term sustainability. Because EDF lends itself as a partner to WalMart, I'm curious to know EDF's position on the toxic cadmium exposure.
OK I've had it. Enough shilling for Wal-mart already. I just received my Spring 2010 copy of "Solutions". Look at the picture at the top of page 9. You never talk about the fact that all those containers go to China and back on the world's least efficient and dirtiest form of transportation. Not do you talk about the fact that Wal-mart forced American companies to move their production to China! Why, partly because China environmental laws were lax and not enforced! Nor do you talk about the city in China that has been poisoned with mercury because of Wal-marts push to sell CFL bulbs.
I'll not being entering any Wal-mart store. And I'll not be funding EDF if you continue shilling for Wal-Mart!