Heineken

Governance and accountability for sustainable development
The company provides evidence of linking performance criteria in senior executives’ remuneration policies to targets and objectives which cover nature, including biodiversity, and social issues.

Stakeholder engagement
The company’s stakeholder engagement covers nature, including biodiversity, nutrition and social issues.

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. Furthermore, it has group-wide targets on key sustainability topics for the most material parts of its value chain and reports consistently against all its targets.

Scope 1, 2, and 3 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
The company has set targets to achieve net zero in scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2030, based on a 2018 baseline. Additionally, it has disclosed a near-term target to reduce its total GHG emissions (scope 1, 2, and 3) by 30% by 2030. The company also consistently reports on its progress towards these scope 1 and 2 targets. Furthermore, the company has established a time-bound goal to reduce its scope 3 GHG emissions and provides regular updates on its progress in achieving these targets. It shows leadership by aligning all its GHG emissions reduction targets with a 1.5-degree trajectory.

Plastic use and packaging waste
The company demonstrates commitment, has policies or partakes in activities related to plastic use reduction and transitioning towards sustainable packaging. Additionally, the company provides quantitative data on their efforts to reduce plastic use and use more sustainable packaging.

Soil health and agrobiodiversity
The company discloses activities to improve soil health in its sourcing practices. This includes the Low Carbon Farming Programme (LCFP), which advises farmers on different regenerative protocols, such as cover cropping, no tillage, and organic matter use.

Water withdrawal
The company engages with suppliers to reduce water withdrawal.

Responsible marketing
The company has a responsible marketing policy that covers all media channels, aimed at reducing children exposure to alcohol marketing and limiting the appeal of alcohol marketing.

Forced labour
The company prohibits the payment of any recruitment fees or related costs to secure a job, and it does not retain workers’ personal documents or restrict workers’ freedom of movement in its operations.

Living wage
The company discloses that 99.96% of its direct employees are paid a fair wage. This wage is sufficient for a decent standard of living, ensuring that both the employee and their family’s basic needs are covered.

Act ethically
The company publicly commits to personal data protection. It discloses its global tax strategy and has a policy statement that clarifies its non-participation in political contributions.

Furthermore, the company has a policy against bribery and corruption and includes anti-bribery and anti-corruption clauses in its contracts with direct business associates. There is a grievance mechanism in place for stakeholders to voice concerns and complaints. It also employs risk-based third-party due diligence and provides both internal and external awareness training to pinpoint bribery and corruption risks. Moreover, it works closely with forensic experts to detect fraud risks.

Provide and promote decent work
The company has public policy statements that commits it to respect the health and safety of its workers and extends this expectation to its business partners. Additionally, it has set a time-bound target for paying all workers a living wage and describes the living wage determination methodology for the regions where it operates.

Furthermore, the company publicly commits to gender equality and women’s empowerment. It aims to increase the proportion of women in its senior management to 30% by 2025 and 40% by 2030. Currently, women make up 40% of its Board of Directors.

Additionally, it discloses the gender and age distribution for every employee category in its direct operations and that 62% of its direct operations workforce is covered by collective bargaining agreements.

Respect human rights
The company has a publicly available policy statement committing it to respect fundamental human rights along with a grievance mechanism accessible to all workers and all external stakeholders. It also commits to respect the International Labour Organization (ILO) fundamental rights at work throughout its operations and supply chain.

Additionally, it describes the process for identifying its human rights risks and impacts in specific locations or activities covering its own operations and supply chain. It further clarifies how it evaluates these risks and discloses its salient human rights issues. A case study is provided to describe the company’s response to a salient human rights risk issue.

Governance and accountability for sustainable development
While the company states that the board of directors has expertise in sustainability, it has an opportunity to disclose whether its highest governance body has expertise with respect to the company’s 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 how it engages with stakeholders, the issues raised during such activities, and the outcomes of its stakeholder engagement, beyond materiality assessment.

Scope 1, 2, and 3 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
The company reports that its scope 3 emissions decreased by 0.4% compared to the 2018 baseline but increased when comparing 2020 and 2021 data. It also has an opportunity to report progress against its scope 3 targets.

Soil health and agrobiodiversity
The company has an opportunity to disclose a target to improve soil health in its sourcing practices and report progress against it.

Water withdrawal
The company has an opportunity to provide measurable evidence of its efforts to reduce water withdrawal in its own operations. Currently, the company discloses reduction targets for water consumption, absolute water use, and water intensity. However, there is room for improvement by also disclosing a target to reduce water withdrawal across its operations and providing updates on the progress made towards this target.

Availability of nutritious foods
The company discloses that it is expanding its lower-calorie offerings. However, it has an opportunity to share data on its efforts to reduce sugar and calories across its portfolio.

Clear and transparent labelling
The company has an opportunity to make nutritional information more visible to consumers through the adoption of front-of-pack labels and/or any other consumer-facing nutrition label.

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.

Child labour
The company states that it takes necessary steps to establish remediation programs in case of child labor, but it could provide more details on specific ways it supports children’s education and improves working conditions for young workers. To enforce its stance on prohibiting child labor and verifying worker age, the company can incorporate these requirements into its policies. In addition to collaborating with value chain partners to address instances of child labour, the company can also outline how it helps suppliers develop the capacity to prevent and handle child labor situations.

Forced labour
The company has an opportunity to translate its expectations for suppliers regarding the prohibition of restricting workers’ freedom of movement and paying recruitment fees into policy requirements. While the company is a member of the Consumer Goods Forum (CGF) Human Rights Coalition – Working to End Forced Labour (HRC), it could indicate how it builds suppliers’ capacity to prevent and address 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.

Act ethically
The company has a publicly available policy statement setting out its lobbying approach. However, it has an opportunity to also establish a policy setting for its political engagement approach. It can further demonstrate ethical practices by transparently disclosing lobbying expenditures and set requirements for third-party lobbyists to comply with its lobbying and political engagement policy.

Provide and promote decent work
The company has an opportunity to disclose how it monitors the health and safety performance of its suppliers. Furthermore, while it has set expectations on the wage paid by its suppliers, it has an opportunity to add a requirement for them to pay a living wage, and disclose how it supports the payment.

Moreover, it could disclose the ratio of the basic salary and remuneration of women to men in its total direct operations workforce for each employee category, by significant locations of operation.

Respect human rights
The company could establish a global system to address these salient human rights issues by implementing preventive, mitigative, or remedial measures.