Aldi Nord

No leading practices were identified for the company in the governance and strategy measurement area.

No leading practices were identified for this company in the environment measurement area.

No leading practices were identified for the company in the nutrition measurement area.

No leading practices were identified for the company in the social inclusion measurement area.

Sustainable development strategy
The company discloses the process and outcomes of its materiality assessment as well as targets and reporting against most environment and nutrition targets. It can improve by setting targets for topics in the social inclusion measurement area.

Governance and accountability for sustainable development
The company provides an overview of the roles in their sustainability department, which includes oversight by the managing directors. However, the company lacks disclosure on whether it considers sustainability objectives in its remuneration policies.

Stakeholder engagement
Aldi Nord provides an overview of its stakeholder engagement activities and the issues discussed. However, the company could further improve its disclosures by reporting on how it identifies its most relevant stakeholders and ensuring its stakeholder engagement covers sustainability topics across all three benchmark dimensions (environment, nutrition and social inclusion) in its value chain.

Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas emissions
The company has a target for a 40% reduction in GHG emissions in all Aldi Nord companies by the end of 2021, compared to the reference year 2015, and reports against it. The company can further strengthen its commitment by aligning its target with a 1.5-degree trajectory.

Protection of terrestrial natural ecosystems
While Aldi Nord provides evidence of achieving deforestation and conversion-free (DCF) supply chains through purchasing policies and disclosing amounts of certified commodities, it has set targets for only some of its high-risk commodities such as palm oil and soya. The company can improve by setting DCF targets for all its relevant high-risk commodities and regularly reporting progress against them.

Water use
Aldi Nord discloses its water consumption level but fails to demonstrate quantitative reductions. While the company discloses working with the National German Water Protection Policy 2019 in terms of responsible handling of water in food and textile supply chains, no evidence of reduction targets or reporting was found.

Food loss and waste
The company discloses a number of processes to prevent food loss and waste (FLW) through price reductions and logistics, among others, and works with supply chain partners through regional and national initiatives on FLW. However, the company has only begun setting targets on FLW and is yet to report progress against them.

Plastic use and packaging waste
While Aldi Nord is committed to reducing plastic use and packaging waste by setting several new targets, such as 100% recyclable, compostable or reusable packaging by the end of 2025 and 15% less packaging by end of 2025, the company is yet to report progress against these targets.

Animal welfare
While Aldi Nord has an animal welfare policy, it lacks sufficient public disclosure on addressing specific animal welfare issues for its relevant key species. The company has targets to cease the sale of eggs from cage systems by 2025, but no evidence of targets was found for its other relevant species and products.

Availability of healthy foods
Aldi Nord provides qualitative evidence of improving the nutritional quality of its products and has set new targets to improve the nutrient composition in 100% of its defined product groups by 2022. However, the company can do more by providing quantitative evidence of improving the nutritional quality of its products, disclosing its definition of healthy products and setting sales-based targets for the percentage of healthy foods in its portfolio.

Accessibility and affordability of healthy foods
While Aldi Nord provides some evidence of commitments towards promoting affordable and healthy foods, it has an opportunity to develop commercial activities designed specifically to make healthy foods more accessible and affordable for vulnerable groups.

Clear and transparent labelling
While the company demonstrates its commitment towards clear, intuitive and accurate front-of pack labelling by disclosing the adoption of Nutri-Score for some of its markets, it can strengthen its performance by disclosing the percentage of products for which such labelling commitments have been rolled out.

Responsible marketing
Aldi Nord has set a number of new targets for responsible marketing. These include standardising the criteria for products for children according to national guidelines while striving to comply with the World Health Organization recommendation, alongside existing targets on avoiding marketing unhealthy products for children and advertising and promoting healthy products by the end of 2021. The company is also a signatory to the Belgian Pledge, a commitment to ban advertisements for unhealthy products aimed at children younger than 12 years old. However, the company can further strengthen its commitment to responsible marketing by setting targets to increase the proportion of its marketing budget spent on promoting healthy foods and reporting against the targets.

Workforce nutrition
The company does not disclose a workforce nutrition programme that prioritises making healthy foods the standard in the workplace.

Food safety
While Aldi Nord discloses compliance with national regulations, it has an opportunity to disclose that 100% of its own operations are certified to a food safety certification programme recognised by the Global Food Safety Initiative or other widely recognised certification.

Child labour
Aldi Nord commits to prohibiting child labour in its own operations and requires its suppliers to adhere to the same standard. In addition, the company requires its suppliers to have an age-verification system in place. While the company discloses processes for monitoring and remediation across its supply chain, it lacks a coordinated and consistent monitoring system for its own operations.

Forced labour
Through its human rights policy statement and its forced labour policy, Aldi Nord commits to prohibiting forced labour in its operations and requires its suppliers to adhere to the same standard. In addition, the company prohibits suppliers from retaining workers’ personal documents and restricting workers’ freedom of movement. However, the company does not provide sufficient evidence regarding respecting workers’ right to freedom of association and collective bargaining, nor does it specify that it does not interfere with workers seeking to exercise these rights.

Living wage
While the company describes how it works to support the payment of a living wage in its supply chain, it has not yet achieved paying all workers a living wage across its own operations, nor set a target to do so.

Health and safety of vulnerable groups
The company does not disclose that it specifically recognises the health and safety risks to vulnerable groups, such as migrant and temporary labourers, women and young farmers.

Farmer and fisher productivity and resilience
While the company provides evidence of supporting farmer productivity through its programme involving implementation of good agricultural practices by smallholders in Côte d’Ivoire, no evidence was found regarding the impact of its activities.

Land rights
The company does not commit to recognising and respecting the legitimate tenure rights related to the ownership and use of land of local communities.

Aldi Nord is committed to respecting human rights and discloses a human rights due diligence process which includes the assessment of the salient human rights risks in its operations and supply chain. As part of this process, the company provides grievance mechanisms that are accessible to employees and external stakeholders such as communities. Aldi Nord has opportunities to strengthen its commitment through greater disclosure on how it identifies and acts on human rights risks and impact assessments.

While Aldi Nord commits to respecting the health and safety of workers, it can improve by expecting its supply chain partners to commit to respecting the health and safety of their workers, disclosing quantitative information and monitoring processes. While the company describes how it works to support the payment of a living wage in its supply chain by its participation in the German retailers’ working group on living incomes and wages, it is yet to set targets for paying all workers a living wage. Furthermore, Aldi Nord can improve its score by strengthening its commitments and disclosure on working hours, collective bargaining, workforce diversity, gender equality and women’s empowerment.

Aldi Nord provides limited commitments towards protecting personal data protection and addressing bribery and corruption. It can improve in this area by disclosing public commitments to protect personal data and including bribery and corruption clauses in its contracts with supply chain partners. Furthermore, no evidence of commitments was found on responsible tax and responsible lobbying and political engagement.