1/2/24, 4:59 PM Top Sustainability Topics & Trends in 2024 for Consumer Products Companies — Colin Price Consulting

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DEC 26

Top Sustainability Topics & Trends in 2024 for

Consumer Products Companies

A number of material sustainability and ESG issues for consumer product companies gained
considerable traction this year.

We expect more attention, investment, and innovation for some of these trends to accelerate
even more in the year to come.

In this post we take a look at these need-to-know sustainability trends and offer insight into
how brands can approach them in credible and authentic ways.

We also offer some “watch outs” for these trends - places where brands can trip themselves
up unnecessarily but can avoid common pitfalls with a little diligence.

Regenerative Food Systems

What’s the trend about?

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The concept of a food system is meant to be inclusive of all people and processes that are involved in growing,
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raising or making food and feeding it to people - as well as what and how we manage wastes.
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Similar to other types of product life cycles, many BLOG
of the environmental
CONTACTand social impacts associated with
our foods and other agricultural products can be found in the upstream phases - in the growing, harvesting,
and processing stages.
The production phases of our food systems offer key points of leverage for transformation through actions
that increase their resilience and their regenerative capacity.

From a global perspective, our food systems represent significant opportunities for creating a more
sustainable and equitable world. Transforming key elements of our food systems can have major impacts on
our health and the health of our environments.
Several global threats face our food systems–food security, nutritional value, safety and livelihood of farmers
and farm workers, the health of the land and more.

Regenerative approaches to agricultural production have social and economic benefits like producing
healthier foods, safer work environments, and more equitable farm livelihoods.
Using regenerative practices tends to make the whole food system more resilient, which in turn makes it
more sustainable over time.

Regenerative farming often gets lumped with organic agriculture, but they are complementary practices with
key differences. Organic farming’s primary focus is producing food without certain synthetic
chemicals. While regenerative practices are designed around three pillars: soil health & land management,
animal welfare, and social fairness.

While organic production can positively impact soil health, it doesn’t necessarily mean there is an effort to
regenerate degraded land and enhance ecosystems like with regenerative.

Organic farming currently has a widely adopted and recognized certification process and is governed by
national and international bodies (like USDA Organic).
While regenerative agriculture has been a hot topic recently, it’s rooted in ancient concepts that have been
used by indigenous peoples worldwide for thousands of years.

How to approach this trend?

>>Our recommendation: Formulate and source ingredients and materials from credible regenerative organic
producers.<<

Regenerative agriculture is getting more mainstream attention despite its historic roots. For the world to see
the benefits on a large scale, we need more brands to prioritize producers and suppliers adopting these
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practices.
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If you’re a brand looking to invest in regenerative farming toTOGETHER
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your value
THEchain,
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consider adding these elements to your procurement and supplier
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1. Supply chain traceability: Invest time and resources into supply chain traceability to ensure your
suppliers adhere to credible regenerative practices since the industry currently lacks regulated
standards. Remember, a farm in India is going to have different practices than one from Minnesota
even if the goal is the same. Being able to trace what farms your ingredients are coming from, and
having an open dialogue with those suppliers about their practices is one of the best ways to evaluate
options.
2. Longer-term contractual commitments: Transformation to regenerative systems take time. Support
farmers and communities who are transitioning and learning how to adopt (or re-adopt) these practices
to their unique ecological environment. An example of this is happening in the Erode region in India.
Known for their production of cotton that has led to higher cancer rates and land degradation (5).
Fibershed has launched a project to support the re-ruralization of textile manufacturing.
3. Policy engagement and industry collaboration: Support growth and easier access to regenerative
agriculture by encouraging policy change. This includes the support of items similar to the ones
outlined by Natural Resources Defense Council, like: policy reform that promote and rewards
regenerative agriculture, investing in infrastructure that creates operational capacity for regenerative
farmers, and funding research around the various regenerative farming practices.
>>Watch Out: Regenerative farming varies in practice, has no broadly accepted standard, and is not currently
regulated. Get transparency into how suppliers have adopted regenerative farming, including third party
certifications like the one from Regenerative Organic Alliance (ROA), to ensure credibility.<<

Value Chain Decarbonization

What’s the trend about?

Calculating a company’s greenhouse gas emissions is step one in taking meaningful climate action. It is a big
undertaking and is resource intensive–but imperative.
As you may know, the carbon footprint for a business includes three “scopes”:

• Scope 1: Direct emissions owned by a company (ex: gas in owned delivery trucks)
• Scope 2: Indirect emissions from a company’s purchased energy (ex: electricity for HQ)
• Scope 3: Indirect emissions from across the lifecycle and through the entire value chain (ex:
greenhouse gas emissions from mining & processing raw materials)

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In the CPG world, most of a company's footprint is often classified as scope 3. This includes the steps in a
value chain where raw materials and ingredients are produced asABOUT
well as where the finished goods are actually
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We’ve seen upwards of 98% of emissions coming from scope 3 for some product categories and industries.
That’s why many companies increasingly recognize that meaningful emissions reduction requires
decarbonizing their value chains, both upstream and downstream.
If we are going to limit the rise in global average temperature to less than 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, we
must reduce global atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gasses by about 90% no later than 2050.
Half of the world’s largest companies have committed to a goal of net zero emissions by 2050 with very
limited use of high quality carbon offsets. Dramatically reducing emissions from your supply chain is
mandatory for achieving a science-based net zero emission goal.

How to approach this trend?

>>Our recommendation: Craft a credible decarbonization plan & share it publicly - then take action<<

You’ve measured. You’ve committed. Time for action. Start by building a decarbonization plan.
We’ve covered the characteristics of credible decarbonization plans in our article “Building a Credible
Decarbonization Plan”. Having a robust and publicly available plan will be increasingly necessary to have
credibility when it comes to climate action.

Not having a plan or having one that is missing major elements without explanation will be seen as
greenwashing with customers, investors, and eventually regulators.
We’ve seen some interesting examples of decarbonization plans already. We like Unilever’s Climate Transition
Action Plan as an interesting early example of how these can look - but note a number of omissions that
should probably be addressed in future versions.

There are also a number of helpful resources currently available for brands looking to take a DIY approach to
building a decarbonization plan and taking action. We recommend starting with the SME Climate Hub action
guides.

As you would expect, value chain decarbonization requires some new and innovative approaches to supplier
engagement. One of the key barriers to driving emissions reductions in supply chains, particularly with SMEs
is related to financing. How can the costs and benefits of actions that reduce greenhouse gas emissions be
fairly distributed across businesses in partnership?
>>Watch Out: Voluntary carbon credits rightfully come under scrutiny for multiple reasons related to their actual
emissions benefits and permanence - the use of verifiable carbon removal credits should only be considered once
you’ve reached your SBT<<
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We’ve seen examples of this with other impact-related challenges, like H&M covering the cost of higher
wages for workers in Bangladesh. What’s the role of national andABOUT
international governments in supporting
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One thing is certain: We will need collective action, within industries and across industries as well as
amongst governments to achieve the rapid transformation necessary to protect the future of life on this
planet.

Protecting Biodiversity

What’s the trend about?

Currently, 1 million animal and plant species face extinction.

Species extinction has happened throughout the history due to natural causes and over long periods of time.
But now more species are going extinct at a faster because of humans.
The primary culprit is the conversion of land from natural habitats like forests to agricultural land or human
settlements. A root cause of this kind of land conversion (like other sustainability challenges) is the failure of
the market to price common goods like natural capital and ecosystem services.

Diverse and resilient ecosystems are absolutely critical to the future of life on this planet because of all the
fundamental ecosystem services they provide (clean air, water, stable climate, resources, etc.).

When there are natural disasters like fires and floods, biodiversity helps heal and adjust the ecosystem faster.
It also helps contain the spread of certain diseases because of genertic diversity.
Even the level of nutritional value of food supporting all types of organisms (including humans) is linked to
rich biodiversity.
We also believe that all species have intrinsic value beyond their immediate value to humans.

How to approach this trend?

>>Our recommendation: Adopt a deforestation-free policy for your business and consider setting a biodiversity
science-based target<<

For many brands protecting biodiversity is a material sustainability issue that can feel even more complex
than climate change and greenhouse gas emissions.

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In many ways biodiversity has a number of key parallels and interdependencies with greenhouse gas
emissions. ABOUT
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One key parallel (of several) is that much of the impact
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The issues are interdependent because the loss of biodiversity is closely linked to land use change and
deforestation, which directly influences rates of carbon sequestration and greenhouse gas emissions, among
other connections.

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