Alimentation Couche-Tard

Stakeholder engagement
The company discloses the channels it uses to engage with its stakeholder groups.

Scope 1, 2, and 3 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
The company discloses its target to reduce its GHG footprint (Scope 1 and Scope 2) in its total fuel offer by 12% from 2020 figures by 2025

Plastic use and packaging waste
The company shows its commitment through policies and actions aimed at reducing plastic usage and transitioning to sustainable packaging. For example, in its Hong Kong stores, it has replaced plastic utensils with bamboo and wooden alternatives. Similarly, in Canada, it has initiated the process of switching from plastic straws to paper, a change that has already been implemented in Europe.

No leading practices were identified in the nutrition area.

No leading practices were identified in the social inclusion area.

Act ethically
The company discloses a public commitment to protect personal data. Additionally, a clear policy is in place that prohibits bribery and corruption. Furthermore, the company has an established grievance mechanism for stakeholders to raise concerns and complaints related to incidents of bribery and corruption.

Provide and promote decent work
The company discloses the proportion of women in its total direct operations workforce for each employee category. In addition, the company reveals it has 31.25% women on the board, and sets a target to increase the female representation by 35% for directors and upper management positions by 2025.

Respect human rights
The company indicates it has a human rights grievance mechanism accessible to all workers. Reports can be made directly to the Human Resources Department or the local Legal Department. To report anonymously, the ACT Hotline can be contacted via phone or web.

Governance and accountability for sustainable development
While the company discloses a remuneration policy related to sustainability, it has an opportunity to link this policy to improvements in nature-related objectives and social issues. Additionally, the company has an opportunity to disclose whether its highest governance body has expertise with respect to its most material sustainability topics.

Lobbying and advocacy
The company has an opportunity to disclose a list of trade associations of which it is a member. Furthermore, the company can provide a clear and detailed framework for assessing the alignment of these trade associations with its sustainability targets. Additionally, the company can report any potential misalignments between the lobbying activities of its trade associations and its sustainability targets.

Stakeholder engagement
The company has an opportunity to disclose an overview of the issues raised during its stakeholder engagement activities and the outcomes of its stakeholder engagement.

Sustainable development strategy
While the company states that it has conducted a materiality assessment, it has an opportunity to disclose its process for identifying and prioritizing its most relevant sustainability topics and impacts. Furthermore, although it discloses some sustainability objectives, including those related to climate and social inclusion, there is room to establish group-wide targets for the most critical aspects of its value chain. Additionally, while the company consistently reports against some targets, it has the opportunity to ensure consistent reporting against all its targets.

Scope 1, 2, and 3 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
“The company has the opportunity to report progress on its scope 1 and 2 emissions targets, potentially aligning them with a 1.5-degree trajectory. Unfortunately, the company reported an increase in its overall scope 1 and 2 emissions in FY2022. While the company is in the process of determining its baseline for scope 3 emissions, there is currently no evidence of disclosed quantitative reductions for its scope 3 emissions. The company could disclose a time-bound target for reducing its scope 3 emissions. Additionally, the company can report progress on its scope 3 targets, which can also be aligned with a 1.5-degree trajectory.

Animal welfare
While the company has a target that addresses animal welfare issues in its supply chain, it has an opportunity to make it applicable to all species, geographies and products.

Antibiotic use and growth promoting substances
The company has an opportunity to disclose a policy on reducing the prophylactic use of antibiotics and growth promoting substances. Moreover, it could disclose targets to phase out the prophylactic use of antibiotics across all species, geographies and products and report progress against them.

Ecosystem conversion
While the company states that it is working to offer sustainably sourced products, it has an opportunity to disclose some activities and time-bound targets to achieve conversion-free supply chains.

Food loss and waste
The company has the opportunity to disclose its FLW reduction targets and report progress against these targets. Additionally, the company can align its FLW reduction goal with SDG12.3, which aims for a 50% reduction by 2030.

Plastic use and packaging waste
The company has an opportunity to disclose quantitative evidence regarding plastic use reduction and use of sustainable packaging.

Water withdrawal
The company has an opportunity to enhance its disclosures relating to water use and withdrawal.

Accessibility and affordability of nutritious foods
The company has an opportunity to disclose its commitment and commercial activities to improve the accessibility and affordability of nutritious foods.

Availability of nutritious foods
The company has an opportunity to demonstrate how it is improving the nutritional quality of its products. It can also set targets to increase the share of more nutritious products in its portfolio.

Clear and transparent labelling
The company has an opportunity to disclose how it provides nutritional information on its products and how it supports consumers with making healthy food choices through its labelling schemes.

Food safety
The company has an opportunity to disclose its commitment to food safety and demonstrate that its operations and supply chain adhere to food safety standards.

Responsible marketing
The company has an opportunity to disclose its commitment to responsible marketing and its marketing activities to promote healthy food options.

Workforce nutrition
The company has an opportunity to disclose evidence of workforce nutrition programmes.

Child labour
The company has an opportunity to disclose a commitment to prohibit child labour in its supply chain and establish an age-verification system for its value chain. Further, it could provide evidence of how it builds the capacity of its suppliers to prevent child labour impacts.

Farmer and fisher livelihoods
The company’s subsidiary, Circle K, has set up an initiative to promote the social, economic and environmental practices of the farmers but it could demonstrate how it improves farmers’ income resilience through its procurement practices and supply chain relationships. Also, the company has an opportunity to identify living income benchmarks and assess living income gaps for some regions or commodities.

Forced labour
The company has the opportunity to disclose forced labour requirements for its operations and supply chain. Specifically, it could prohibit the payment of recruitment fees, the retention of workers’ personal documents, and the restriction of workers’ freedom of movement. Furthermore, it could provide evidence of how it builds the capacity of its suppliers to prevent forced labour impacts.

Health and safety of vulnerable groups
The company has an opportunity to recognise and assess the health and safety risks to vulnerable groups, such as migrant and temporary labourers, women and young farmers. Furthermore, it could provide evidence of support activities that improve the health and safety of vulnerable groups.

Land rights
The company has an opportunity to disclose a commitment to respect ownership and use of land and natural resources and related legitimate tenure rights. Furthermore, it could describe a process at its operations and supply chain level to identify legitimate tenure rightsholders when acquiring, leasing or making other arrangements to use land and to negotiate with them to provide adequate compensation.

Living wage
The company has an opportunity to set a target for paying a living wage across its direct suppliers and describe how it determines a living wage for the regions where it sources. Also, it could disclose the percentage of workers across its own operations or direct suppliers that are paid a living wage.

Act ethically
The company has an opportunity to describe the process for identifying its bribery and corruption risks and impacts, and include anti-bribery and anti-corruption clauses in contracts with business relationships. Furthermore, the company could disclose how it approaches lobbying and political engagement in a public policy document, and divulge how much it spends on lobbying activities. While it states that it makes political donations after approval from the executive chairman, it can disclose whether these are made only by exception, specify the criteria for making them, and divulge other non-donation political contributions.

Provide and promote decent work
Although the company strives to maintain a safe and healthy work environment, it has an opportunity to use stronger language to show a commitment to these objectives. The company could extend the same expectations to its business relationships, and reveal the mechanism for overseeing supplier adherence.

Moreover, the company could set a time-bound target for paying all workers a living wage or state it has achieved this goal. The company could also explain its method for determining a living wage in each region and how it supports suppliers in paying this wage standard.

Additionally, while the company has made efforts in promoting gender equity and women empowerment, it could formalise these commitments through a public policy document. The company could further divulge information including the ratio of basic salary and remuneration of women to men.

Respect human rights
The company has an opportunity to disclose a policy statement committing to respecting human rights and the ILO fundamental rights at work in its operations and supply chain. While it commits to respecting specific workers’ rights, it has an opportunity to reference all the ILO fundamental rights at work.

Additionally, while the company conducts due diligence in general, it could specify that it conducts human rights due diligence, in particular, and describe comprehensively the process for identifying human rights risks and impacts across all its activities and supply chain. It could further explain how it assesses and identifies its salient human rights issues. Moreover, it could also reveal a global system to prevent, mitigate or remediate its salient human rights issues.