Gruppo Veronesi

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

Sustainable development strategy
The company discloses its process for identifying and prioritising its most relevant sustainability impacts as well as the outcome of this process, in relation to its sustainability strategy. It conducts a  materiality analysis to identify the main issues that significantly impact the group’s activities from an economic, social and environmental point of view and influence the assessments and decisions of stakeholders.

Antibiotic use and growth promoting substances
The company discloses evidence of processes of animal welfare third-party certification audits to verify compliance with its supply chain certifications. It has also launched several innovation projects in line with the continuous progress in the livestock field that provide animal welfare standards well above legal requirements.

Plastic use and packaging waste
The company demonstrates commitment by implementing policies and engaging in activities aimed at reducing plastic use and transitioning to sustainable packaging. Additionally, the company discloses quantitative data relating to both plastic use reduction and the use of sustainable packaging.

Water withdrawal
The company reports how much water is withdrawn for its own operations in water-stressed areas. It notes that only 0.7% of withdrawals and discharges concern areas with water stress.

No leading practices were identified in the nutrition area.

No leading practices were identified in the social inclusion area.

Provide and promote decent work
The company discloses the proportion of its total direct operations workforce covered by collective bargaining agreements. In addition, the company reveals the distribution of its total direct operations workforce among various employee categories based on age group and gender.

Governance and accountability for sustainable development
The company has an opportunity to strengthen its sustainability governance and accountability by designating an individual or body to implement its sustainability strategy and by assigning decision-making and oversight to its highest governance body. It could link senior executives’ compensation to sustainability targets/objectives. Additionally, it could disclose if the highest governance body has expertise in its most material sustainability topics.

Lobbying and advocacy
The company has an opportunity to disclose a clear and detailed framework for assessing alignment of its trade associations with its sustainability targets. Additionally, it 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 discloses some sustainability objectives/targets including ecosystem conversion, it has an opportunity to establish group-wide targets for the most material parts of its value chain. Furthermore, the company has an opportunity to report consistently against all its targets.

Scope 1, 2, and 3 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
The company has an opportunity to disclose reductions in scope 1, 2 and 3 greenhouse gas emissions, and set time-bound targets aligned with the Paris Agreement’s 1.5 degree pathway.

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 can disclose targets to phase out the prophylactic use of antibiotics across all species, geographies and products and report against them.

Ecosystem conversion
The company has an opportunity to disclose its efforts to avoid ecosystem conversion, including deforestation or restoration. The company could develop a strategy and publicly report on specific, time-bound targets.

Water withdrawal
The company has an opportunity to disclose quantitative evidence of reductions in water withdrawal across its own operations. Additionally, the company can disclose a time-bound target to reduce water withdrawal across its operations and report progress against the target. Moreover, the company has a chance to engage with suppliers to reduce water withdrawal.

Availability of nutritious foods
The company has an opportunity to demonstrate how it is improving the nutritional quality of its products and to 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
Although the company states its certification with the BRC Global Standard for Food Safety, it has the chance to further expand these certifications to cover 100% of its own operations. Moreover, the company can also seize an opportunity to disclose the percentage of food suppliers certified to a GFSI-recognised food safety scheme.

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.

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.

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 suppliers that are paid a living wage.

Act ethically
The company has an opportunity to disclose a policy prohibiting bribery and corruption, and include related clauses in contracts with business relationships. It could also describe its process for identifying bribery and corruption, and indicate the existence of a grievance mechanism through which stakeholders can file related complaints.

Further, the company could disclose how it approaches lobbying and political engagement in a public policy document, specify that it does not make any political contributions, and divulge how much it spends on lobbying activities.

Provide and promote decent work
The company can formalise its commitment to worker health and safety in a policy document. It also has an opportunity to require suppliers to adopt this commitment and monitor supplier adherence. Additionally, it could set a time-bound target for paying all workers a living wage or declare that this has been achieved. The company could explain its method for determining a living wage in each region and how it supports suppliers in paying a living wage.

Moreover, it could commit to gender equality and women’s empowerment, along with sharing related time-bound targets and disclosing information such as ratio of women-to-men salary ratio.

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. Additionally, the company could describe a comprehensive 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, and describe how relevant factors, such as geographical, economic and social, are considered. Moreover, it could also reveal a global system to prevent, mitigate or remediate its salient human rights issues.