Wilmar International

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.

Land rights
Through its human rights framework and NDPE policy, Wilmar International refers to respecting tenure rights and recognizing the long-term customary and individual rights of indigenous and local communities. The company discloses a grievance mechanism that is accessible to external individuals and communities. It also reports on corrective action, remediation and group-level systemic changes that need to take place as a result of non-compliance on land rights under its no-exploitation protocol.

Sustainable development strategy
Wilmar International discloses its process for identifying and prioritising its most relevant sustainability topics through a materiality assessment. The company also discloses time-bound targets for its most relevant environmental and social sustainability topics and reports progress against them. While the company has identified material topics relating to nutrition, such as consumer health and product quality, it is yet to set targets and report progress against them.

Governance and accountability for sustainable development
The company discloses the roles and responsibilities of its sustainability department, and states that the chairperson, chief executive officer and the board of directors oversee the sustainability strategy. However, no evidence was found regarding the inclusion of sustainability topics in the remuneration policy of the highest governance body.

Stakeholder engagement
Wilmar International provides an overview of its stakeholder engagement, including engagement platforms, frequency of engagement and outcomes which cover environmental, social and nutrition issues across the value chain. The company can further strengthen its stakeholder engagement by disclosing its process for identifying relevant stakeholders.

Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas emissions
While Wilmar International has set a reduction target for its palm oil mills, and reports progress against it, it has an opportunity to expand the scope of its target across its operations and supply chain, and to ensure that it is aligned with a 1.5-degree trajectory.

Protection of terrestrial natural ecosystems
Wilmar International demonstrates its commitment towards achieving deforestation and conversion-free (DCF) supply chains for its high-risk commodities through its No Deforestation, No Peat, No Exploitation (NDPE) policy. The company has set a target to achieve Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil certification for all its own palm oil operations (refineries by 2020, mills by 2023) and reports progress against the target. The company only discloses the percentage of palm oil volumes from suppliers with no-deforestation commitments and does not provide evidence of such targets or reporting for its soya supply chains.

Soil health and agrobiodiversity
While the company provides some qualitative evidence of supporting its sugarcane farmers through practices to improve soil health, it has the opportunity to set targets to increase the percentage of production from sustainable practices that improve soil health and agrobiodiversity and require its suppliers to do the same.

Fertiliser and pesticide use
As part of its NDPE policy, Wilmar International aims to minimise the use of pesticides and seek alternative pest-control methods. The company also provides evidence of working with suppliers to reduce chemical use on its oil palm and sugarcane plantations. However, it can further strengthen its commitment by setting targets to increase the percentage of production from sustainable practices that improve soil health and agrobiodiversity and requiring its suppliers to do the same.

Water use
Wilmar International has set reduction targets for its palm oil mills and conducted water-risk assessments for its production sites. However, it has an opportunity to expand the scope of its targets to cover all its operations and to engage with suppliers, particularly in water-stressed areas in its supply chain.

Food loss and waste
While the company provides qualitative evidence of reusing organic waste across its palm oil facilities and sugar milling operations, it can further improve by setting targets to reduce food loss and waste across its own operations, reporting progress against them and collaborating with value chain partners to prevent food loss and waste.

Availability of healthy foods
Wilmar International provides qualitative evidence of improving the nutritional quality of its products through its subsidiaries YKA and Goodman Fielder. However, the company can improve by disclosing further information on reduction of salt, sugar and fat in its products as well as setting targets to increase the percentage of healthy foods in its portfolio.

Accessibility and affordability of healthy foods
While the company is committed to providing its consumers access to healthy, nutritious and affordable foods, especially in emerging markets, no evidence of strategic commercial activities designed to improve the accessibility and affordability of such healthy foods was found.

Clear and transparent labelling
Wilmar International discloses its commitments to comply with national regulations regarding labelling, and its commitment to make this nutritional information available to consumers in a clear, intuitive and accurate way through front-of-pack labelling such as the Health Star Rating adopted by its subsidiary Goodman Fielder. The company can improve its reporting by also disclosing the percentage of products for which such labelling commitments have been rolled out.

Responsible marketing
While the company demonstrates its commitment to responsible marketing through its subsidiary Goodman Fielder, it is unclear if this commitment covers all of Wilmar International’s consumer-facing products. Moreover, no evidence was found of activities that support its commitment.

Workforce nutrition
Wilmar International offers nutrition education through internal newsletters and breastfeeding support for its employees. The company has an opportunity to further strengthen its commitment towards workforce nutrition by promoting nutrition-focused health checks, providing healthy food at work and disclosing quantitative evidence regarding the percentage of food offerings with healthy options.

Food safety
While the company provides evidence that all of its own operations are certified to a food safety programme recognised by the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI) or other widely recognised certification, no evidence was found regarding the percentage of its food suppliers that are certified to a GFSI-recognised food safety programme or other widely recognised certification.

Child labour
Through its human rights framework and child protection policy, Wilmar International indicates that it does not use child labour and requires that its suppliers adhere to the same standard. Through its supplier reporting tool, the company provides evidence of monitoring processes for its supply chain, and parts of its own operations such as its mills and associated estates.

Forced labour
Wilmar International indicates that it does not use forced labour, retain workers’ personal documents or restrict workers’ freedom of movement in its own operations and requires its suppliers to adhere to the same standards. The company commits to not interfering with the rights of workers to form or join trade unions and to bargain collectively. However, no sufficient evidence was found regarding prohibition of any form of intimidation of workers seeking to exercise these rights. Through its supplier reporting tool, the company provides evidence of monitoring processes for its supply chain, and parts of its own operations such as its mills and associated estates.

Living wage
Wilmar International discloses having assessed 100% of its employees and contractors to ensure that they are paid a living wage. While it states that it will be assessing all of its suppliers to ensure that they are paying their workers a living wage using its supplier reporting tool, no evidence was found of living wage requirements in its contractual arrangements with its suppliers.

Health and safety of vulnerable groups
Wilmar International provides evidence of support activities that improve the health and safety of vulnerable groups. These include provision of free accommodation for its factory workers in YKA and its plantation workers in Malaysia. The company can further strengthen its commitment by assessing the health and safety risks to vulnerable workers in its supply chain and requiring its suppliers to identify and address health and safety risks for vulnerable groups.

Farmer and fisher productivity and resilience
The company demonstrates its commitment to support farmer productivity and resilience through initiatives focusing on provision of planting materials, capacity building and training, among others for farmers in Ghana, Indonesia, Malaysia and India. However, the company is yet to disclose the impact of such support activities.

Wilmar International discloses policies and commitments across most key topics relating to respect for human rights. The company also discloses evidence of a comprehensive human rights due diligence process, which includes the identification, assessment and integration of salient human rights risks in its operations and supply chain. However, there remains an opportunity for Wilmar International to improve its disclosure on engagement with affected and potentially affected stakeholders.

While Wilmar International publicly commits to respecting the health and safety of workers, paying its workers a living wage and gender equality and women’s empowerment, the company can improve its performance by increasing its disclosure on these topics. Moreover, Wilmar International can strengthen its living wage ambitions by expanding the scope of its commitments to include all operations. Lastly, Wilmar International does not disclose a sufficient commitment on working hours fundamentals in its operations, nor does it report on key metrics regarding collective bargaining.

Wilmar International discloses a publicly available commitment to responsible lobbying and political engagement. The company addresses personal data protection and bribery and corruption in publicly available policies or statements but could improve its score by increasing disclosure on these topics. Moreover, while Wilmar International discloses its group tax policy, the company can further strengthen its commitment by ensuring executive-level accountability for compliance with its strategy and disclosing income tax paid for each tax jurisdiction.