KWS

Lobbying and advocacy
The company discloses a list of trade associations of which it is a member wherever it operates.

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.

Scope 1, 2, and 3 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
The company discloses its target to reduce its scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas emissions by 50% in absolute terms from 2021 levels by the year 2030.

Soil health and agrobiodiversity
The company discloses activities to improve soil health and agrobiodiversity in its production practices.

Availability of nutritious foods
The company has announced plans to invest in breeding programs for new crops, including food and protein crops, and to develop high-performance varieties with improved nutrient profiles. Additionally, the company has expanded its seed portfolio to include a variety of vegetables, aiming to offer a broader range of nutritious food options. As part of its Sustainability Ambition 2030, the company has established long-term targets: to increase the number of crops with dedicated breeding programs from 24 to 27 by 2030, enriching crop rotation options, and ensuring that over 40% of its varieties are suitable for direct use in human nutrition.

Furthermore, KWS has recently launched a seed project in Zambia in collaboration with other partners. The primary goal of this initiative is to empower farmers by enhancing their skills and knowledge in seed assessment for various crops, including corn, sunflower, beans, and sorghum varieties. The project successfully reached 1,018 farmers, with 44% of them being women and 18% under the age of 30.

Workforce nutrition
The company has implemented a nutrition education programme for its employees.

No leading practices were identified in the social inclusion area.

Act ethically
The company has a clear policy against bribery and corruption. It also incorporates anti-bribery and anti-corruption clauses into its contracts with direct business partners.

In addition, the company provides a compliance reporting platform that allows individuals to report concerns and complaints about bribery and corruption without fear of retaliation. This mechanism is easily accessible to everyone through the company’s website.

Provide and promote decent work
The company discloses that over 50% of its entire direct operations workforce is protected by collective bargaining agreements. It also has a publicly available statement of policy that expects its business relationships to commit to respecting the health and safety of their workers. In order to ensure compliance with these standards, the company conducts regular audits to monitor adherence to its suppliers’ code of conduct, which includes provisions for health and safety.

Moreover, the company provides detailed information regarding the composition of its direct operations workforce, disclosing the proportion of employees in each age group. Furthermore, the company also discloses the proportion of women within its direct operations workforce, broken down by different employee categories. To further promote gender equality, the company has set specific targets to achieve by 2022.

Respect human rights
The company has a compliance reporting platform that allows external stakeholders to raise complaints or concerns regarding human rights issues. This platform is accessible to all individuals who may be negatively affected by the company’s operations.

Governance and accountability for sustainable development
The company has an opportunity to link performance criteria in senior executives’ remuneration policies to targets and objectives which cover environmental and social issues. Furthermore, it could 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 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 how it engages with stakeholders, the issues raised during such activities, and the outcomes of its stakeholder engagement.

Sustainable development strategy
The company discloses some sustainability objectives/targets including climate; however, it has an opportunity to establish group-wide targets for the most material parts of its value chain. Moreover, while it reports consistently against some targets including climate, it could report consistently against all its targets.

Scope 1, 2, and 3 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
The company has disclosed a 10% increase in its scope 1 emissions and a 4% increase in its scope 2 emissions compared to the previous year. There is an opportunity for the company to reduce its scope 1 and 2 emissions, as well as report progress against the targets that it has set. Additionally, its scope 1 and 2 emissions targets can potentially be aligned with a 1.5-degree trajectory. Regarding scope 3 emissions, there is room for reduction as well. Although the company states its intention to include scope 3 emissions in its targets, there is no evidence of any current targets for reducing scope 3 emissions. It has an opportunity to set scope 3 targets aligned with a 1.5-degree trajectory and report its progress against these targets.

Fertiliser and pesticide use
The company has an opportunity to disclose targets that encompass optimizing the use of fertilizers as part of its R&D and value chain activities, and report progress against these targets. Additionally, while the company discloses a strategy for reducing the use of pesticides, it could make its target timebound.

Plastic use and packaging waste
The company could disclose quantitative evidence regarding plastic use reduction and use of sustainable packaging.

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

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

Workforce nutrition
The company could disclose the length covered by its parental leave policy, as well as any other breastfeeding supports such as dedicated breastfeeding rooms or flexible working hours for breastfeeding mothers. Furthermore, it has an opportunity to implement a programme to offer healthy food options to its employees and to expand its nutrition initiatives to its supply chain workers.

Child labour
The company has an opportunity to disclose examples of remediation programmes when a case of child labour is found in its operations and to indicate how it is building the capacity of its suppliers to prevent child labour impacts. While the company prohibits its suppliers from using child labour, it could require them to have an age-verification system in place.

Farmer and fisher livelihoods
The company has set up initiatives to improve the productivity of the farms but it could to demonstrate how it improves farmers’ income resilience through its procurement practices and supply chain relationships. Also, it has an opportunity to identify living income benchmarks and assess living income gaps for some regions or commodities.

Forced labour
The company has an opportunity to disclose forced labour requirements for its operations and supply chain such as a prohibition to pay recruitment fees, to retain workers’ personal documents or to restrict workers’ freedom of movement. Further, 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 suppliers that are paid a living wage.

Act ethically
The company has an opportunity to outline its process for identifying bribery and corruption risks and impacts in specific locations or activities related to its own operations. Furthermore, the company could establish a policy that outlines its approach to lobbying and political engagement.

While the company states that it does not provide funding to political parties or politicians, it could strengthen this commitment by documenting it in a public policy document. Additionally, the company could provide transparency by disclosing its expenditures on lobbying activities. Lastly, the company could require third-party lobbyists to adhere to its lobbying and political engagement policy.

Provide and promote decent work
To ensure fair compensation, the company has the chance to commit to paying a living wage by setting a time-bound target, moving beyond minimum wage for its employees. This commitment could be bolstered by disclosing how the company determines a living wage tailored to the regions of its operations. Extending its influence, the company also has the opportunity to require its suppliers to pay a living wage, adding a crucial dimension to its expectations and disclosing the mechanisms it employs to support this.

Shifting focus to worker safety, while the company acknowledges its respect for health and safety, formalizing this commitment within a public policy document would further underline its dedication. Similarly, the company’s statement on gender equality and women’s empowerment can be elevated through translation into a dedicated public policy, solidifying its stance. This commitment can be complemented by the disclosure of gender pay ratios across different employee categories and significant operational locations, emphasizing transparency and progress in these crucial areas.

Respect human rights
In terms of human rights commitment, the company showcases its dedication through statements acknowledging the ILO’s fundamental rights at work. However, an opportunity exists to elevate these statements by formalizing them within a comprehensive policy document. Going further, the company could extend its influence to suppliers by disclosing a policy that compels them to uphold the ILO-declared fundamental rights at work.

To enhance transparency, the company has the potential to share the outcomes of its human rights risk assessment. It could also detail the systematic process for identifying human rights risks and impacts across specific locations and activities. Moreover, while the company discloses that it conducts due diligence in general, it has an opportunity to specify that it conducts human rights due diligence that includes a process for identifying human rights risks and impacts in its supply chain.

Furthermore, on a global scale, the company has the chance to introduce a system that effectively tackles, prevents, and mitigates salient human rights issues.