Biodiversity risk assessment process and commitment statement
Aligned to our purpose to make the world cleaner, healthier, and more productive, in 2023, we completed our first biodiversity risk assessment at our main manufacturing sites, which together represent around 70% of the Group’s Scope 1 and 2 emissions.
For each of the 12 manufacturing locations included, we conducted location-specific desk-based research on the potential nature-related impacts and dependencies arising at each site, following the TNFD’s LEAP (Locate, Evaluate, Assess and Prioritise) framework. We used ENCORE (“Exploring Nature Capital Opportunities, Risks and Exposure”), the key tool recommended by the TNFD, to conduct our screening of potential impacts and dependencies relevant to our sector.
Working with the sustainability leads of our businesses, we assessed on a qualitative basis the possible relevance of each impact and dependency for the sites in scope, providing us with an initial high-level understanding of which sites are likely to be most pertinent for further consideration of biodiversity-related impacts and dependencies.
This process has helped us enhance our understanding of how we can continue to consider nature and biodiversity impacts and dependencies in our direct operations. We also continue to engage on all sustainability topics with our supply chain using EcoVadis, and through our Supplier Code of Conduct, which requests that suppliers should be proactive on biodiversity issues and commit to the TNFD’s LEAP approach to better understand and mitigate their own nature-related risks.
We will continue to review this assessment, including expanding our analysis to our supply chain as we build oversight of our suppliers through EcoVadis.
Sustainability reporting
We are committed to transparent and meaningful reporting of our approach to sustainability to ensure we can clearly understand and explain our impacts and progress, and respond appropriately. We report our environmental impacts including our carbon footprint, and progress against our Net Zero ambition annually through our annual report and CDP disclosures, whilst also responding readily to relevant regulations and reporting indices. On an annual basis, we undertake third-party assurance on our carbon footprint emissions and energy consumption, including of three scope 3 categories.
