Starbucks

Lobbying and advocacy
The company discloses a list of trade associations of which it is a member. The list covers all jurisdictions in which it operates.

Sustainable development strategy
The company discloses sustainability targets in topics, including climate, water use, and social inclusion. It reports consistently on progress against all of its targets.

Scope 1, 2, and 3 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
The company aims to achieve a 50% absolute reduction in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from scope 1, 2, and 3 across its operation and value chain by 2030. Furthermore, the company’s scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions targets are in line with a 1.5-degree trajectory.

Animal welfare
The company discloses a target that addresses animal welfare issues in its supply chain and reports progress against the target.

Ecosystem conversion
The company discloses some activities to achieve conversion-free supply chains and the proportion of high-risk commodities which are conversion-free. For example, it ensures its coffee is sourced and verified through C.A.F.E. Practices, which includes a zero tolerance standard for the conversion of natural forest.

Plastic use and packaging waste
The company is reducing plastic use and making the shift towards sustainable packaging. It actively participates in activities aimed at achieving these goals. In addition, the company provides quantitative data regarding its progress in reducing plastic use and utilising sustainable packaging. The company has also established a target to increase the use of recycled content in all of its plastic packaging and regularly report on progress towards this target.

Soil health and agrobiodiversity
The company discloses activities to improve soil health or agrobiodiversity in its production or sourcing practices. For instance, it provided financial support to promote soil analysis as a mechanism for farmers to understand soil nutrition requirements.

No leading practices were identified in the nutrition area.

Farmer and fisher livelihoods
The company operates Farmer Support Centers to assist farmers in coffee-producing countries to implement its ethical sourcing practices, Coffee and Farmer Equity Practices, across its coffee supply chain. Additionally, it has established a Global Farmer Fund to enhance the resilience of its supply chain and secure a long-term source of coffee by offering input loans for farmers. The company also pays sustainability premiums, supports Village Saving and Loans Associations (VSLAs), and offers grants to empower women economically, ultimately improving their access to resources and markets.

Act ethically
The company discloses a public commitment to protect personal data. Furthermore, it has a global tax strategy and discloses an executive-level individual who is tasked with accountability for compliance with the company’s global tax strategy. Additionally, the company has a policy prohibiting bribery and corruption and a grievance mechanism for stakeholders to raise concerns and complaints regarding bribery and corruption.

Provide and promote decent work
The company has a public policy statement committing it to respecting the health and safety of workers and expecting its business relationships to do so. Furthermore, The company discloses the proportion of its total direct operations workforce for each employee category by age group and by race or ethnicity. Additionally, the company discloses a target to achieve at least 55% women in all retail roles, 50% women for all enterprise roles, and 30% women in all manufacturing roles by 2025.

Respect human rights
The company has a publicly available policy statement that commits to respecting human rights and the ILO core labour rights. Additionally, the company expects suppliers to respect these core labour rights, as stated in its policy statement. Moreover, the company has implemented a human rights grievance mechanism that is accessible to all workers and to all external stakeholders who may be adversely impacted by the company.

Governance and accountability for sustainable development
The company discloses a remuneration policy related to nature-related objectives and social issues but could further provide detailed information about this policy. While stating that the board of directors has the expertise in nutrition, there is an opportunity for the company to disclose whether its highest governance body has specific expertise with respect to the company’s most material sustainability topics including climate, water, soil health, social inclusion, ecosystem conversion and biodiversity.

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 by each stakeholder group during its stakeholder engagement activities and to describe its process, including frequencies and channels, for engaging with stakeholder groups beyond materiality assessment.

Sustainable development strategy
The company states that it has a materiality assessment but could further disclose its process for identifying and prioritising its most relevant sustainability topics and impacts, including the outcome of the process. While it discloses some sustainability objectives/targets including climate and social inclusion, it has an opportunity to establish group-wide targets for the most material parts of its value chain.

Scope 1, 2, and 3 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
The company has an opportunity to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions under scope 1, 2, and 3. Additionally, the company could report on its progress against these targets.

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.

Ecosystem conversion
The company has an opportunity to disclose time-bound targets to achieve conversion-free supply chains.

Food loss and waste
The company has an opportunity to disclose its FLW reduction targets and report progress against them. It can also consider aligning its FLW reduction goal with SDG12.3 (50% reduction by 2030).

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

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 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 adopt front-of-pack labels or any other consumer- facing nutrition labels that support consumers with making healthier food choices. Additionally, it can disclose the percentage of products for which its front-of-pack labelling schemes have been rolled out.

Food safety
The company has an opportunity to demonstrate that 100% of its own operations are certified to a GFSI food safety scheme or other widely recognised (industry-specific) certification. Additionally, it could disclose the percentage of food suppliers that are certified to a GFSI-recognised food safety scheme.

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 an opportunity to identify living income benchmarks and assess living income gaps for some regions or commodities.

Forced labour
While the company does not allow suppliers to retain workers’ personal documents and restrict workers’ freedom of movement, it has an opportunity to disclose similar commitments for its operations. Furthermore, it could prohibit the payment of recruitment fees or related costs in its value chain. To conclude, the company has an opportunity to indicate how it is building the capacity of its suppliers to prevent forced labour impacts.

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 describe the process for identifying its bribery and corruption risks and impacts in specific locations or activities covering its own operations. It could also include anti-bribery and anti-corruption clauses in its contracts with business relationships.

Furthermore, the company has a publicly available policy statement setting out its approach to employees’ personal political activity and discloses that only authorised partners may engage with political parties, party officials, candidates, or organisations. However, the company could disclose a policy setting out its lobbying and political engagement approach. Moreover, the company could disclose its expenditures on lobbying activities and add a requirement to its 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, the company states that it pledges to provide wages in accordance with all applicable wage laws and regulations. However, it has an opportunity to commit to paying a living wage by setting a time-bound target and to disclose how it determines a living wage for the regions where it operates. While the company has set expectations on the wage paid by its suppliers, it has an opportunity to require them to pay a living wage, and disclose how it supports the payment.

Additionally, while the company has a statement on gender equality and women’s empowerment, it has an opportunity to translate the latter into a public policy document. Moreover, while the company currently has 25% women on the board, it could increase this number to at least 30%. Lastly, the company has an opportunity to disclose the ratio of the basic salary and remuneration of women to men.

Respect human rights
The company has an opportunity to describe the process for identifying its human rights risks and impacts in specific locations or activities, covering its own operations. Additionally, the company could describe its process for assessing and identifying what it considers to be its salient human rights issues, and disclose the results of its human rights risk assessment. It could also establish a global system to act on, prevent or mitigate its salient human rights issues.