Del Monte Pacific

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

No leading practices were identified for the 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
Del Monte Pacific discloses its materiality assessment and describes the process for identifying material issues, which resulted in 30 environmental, social and governance priorities across the categories of product, employees, communities, environment, governance and growth. However, the company can strengthen its performance by disclosing time-bound targets for its sustainability topics, thus enabling reporting against them.

Governance and accountability for sustainable development
Del Monte Pacific’s board provides entrepreneurial leadership and sets the strategic direction for the company, including on sustainability issues, thereby demonstrating accountability for and oversight of the sustainability development strategy. Del Monte Pacific can improve its performance by disclosing its highest governance body’s remuneration policy regarding sustainability.

Stakeholder engagement
Del Monte Pacific provides an overview of its stakeholder engagement activities and discloses its process for identifying stakeholders. However, it does not disclose on the outcomes of stakeholder engagement and their integration into the company’s sustainability strategy. Information is also lacking on whether stakeholder engagement covers sustainability topics across all three benchmark dimensions (environment, nutrition and social inclusion) and across its value chain.

Scope 1, 2 and 3 greenhouse gas emissions
The company does not disclose quantitative evidence to demonstrate that it is reducing its scope 1, 2 and 3 GHG emissions.

Fertiliser and pesticide use
The company discloses quantitative evidence of optimising the use of pesticides through its subsidiary Del Monte Foods, Inc (DMFI), which introduced Integrated Pest Management (IPM) principles in its farming practices. However, Del Monte Pacific has an opportunity to improve its performance by increasing reporting on its activities at the group level and setting time-bound targets.

Plastic use and packaging waste
Del Monte Pacific has various initiatives to reduce the use of plastic. Furthermore, the company reports quantitative evidence of its activities at the subsidiary level. Specifically, Del Monte Philippines has reduced its plastic use by around 21% and it has a target to reduce it by another 15% in the next five years. Moreover, the US subsidiary DMFI decreased its plastic use by 35% and plans to reduce its plastic fruit cups by another 10% by 2021. To strengthen its performance, Del Monte Pacific has an opportunity to set targets at the group level.

Soil health and agrobiodiversity
Del Monte Pacific discloses qualitative evidence of efforts to support soil health and agrobiodiversity through its participation in plantation certifications such as Global Good Agricultural Practices (GLOBALG.A.P.), Philippine Good Agricultural Practices and ISO 9001:2015. In addition, DMFI facilitates soil management by conducting soil sampling and rotating crops. However, Del Monte Pacific has an opportunity to strengthen its commitment by setting targets to increase the percentage of production from sustainable practices that improve soil health and agrobiodiversity, reporting progress against the targets and disclosing quantifiable data on its impact on soil health and agrobiodiversity.

Water use
The company does not disclose that it is reducing water withdrawals across its operations and supply chain.

Availability of healthy foods
Del Monte Pacific references examples of product lines with increased amounts of fruit and vegetables, wholegrains and seeds, and with no sugar added, low salt, reduced salt and low in calories. While Del Monte Pacific provides an overview of thresholds for nutrients such as fibres and vitamins, it has not set thresholds for sugar, salt and fat. The company has an opportunity to improve its performance by providing quantitative evidence of its reformulation activities to reduce the level of salt, sugar and fat and/or increase the level of fruit and vegetables, nuts and wholegrains in its products.

Food safety
The company requires its products worldwide to be GFSI and FSSC certified. Its agro-industrial processes are accredited by the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI) or British Retail Consortium, with 26 quality audits in the United States. However, Del Monte Pacific does not disclose the percentage of food suppliers certified to a GFSI-recognised food safety scheme/certification programme, therefore showing room for improvement.

Clear and transparent labelling
The company does not disclose that it provides nutritional information through clear, transparent and accurate labelling.

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

Child and forced labour
The company does not disclose a policy commitment to prohibit child and forced labour in its supply chain.

Farmer and fisher productivity and resilience
The company does not disclose a commitment or examples of activities to support the resilience, productivity and access to markets for farmers, fishers and/or small-scale producers in its supply chain.

Living wage
The company does not disclose that it pays its workers a living wage or requires its suppliers to do the same. Neither has it set targets to do so in the future.

Although Del Monte Pacific commits to respecting human rights, this does not include a reference to respecting freedom of association and collective bargaining. In addition, no policy commitment requiring its supply chain partners to respect the human rights of workers was found in the public domain. The company lacks disclosure on how it identifies and addresses its most salient human rights issues in its own operations and through relevant supply chain partners. While it provides some details regarding where to raise concerns, the anonymity and external accessibility of these channels are not clear, and no explicit evidence was found of the existence of a grievance mechanism.

While the company has a publicly available policy statement committing it to respect the health and safety of workers, it does not disclose quantitative health and safety data, and it limits the scope of its supplier code of conduct to suppliers of the subsidiary DMFI. It further lacks disclosure on the proportion of its total direct operations workforce for each employee category by age group and ethnicity, only reporting percentage by gender. Neither does it have a commitment to gender equality and women’s empowerment. Finally, Del Monte Pacific discloses neither information on the collective bargaining agreements covering its workforce, nor a time-bound target for paying all workers a living wage.

Del Monte Pacific publicly commits to protecting personal data but lacks disclosure on access to personal data. The company publicly prohibits bribery and corruption while describing the process to identify its bribery and corruption risks and impacts in its own operations. However, it fails to include anti-bribery and anti-corruption clauses in its contracts with supply chain partners as well as information on whether its whistle-blower channel is accessible to external community members and individuals or not. Further, it does not demonstrate a commitment to responsible lobbying and political engagement, nor a global responsible tax approach