B&G Foods

No leading practices were identified for the company in the governance and strategy area.

No leading practices were identified for the company in the ecosystems and biodiversity area.

No leading practices were identified for the company in the social inclusion and community impact area.

Act ethically
The company discloses a public commitment to protect personal data and its approach to lobbying and political engagement in a policy statement. It also includes anti-bribery and anti-corruption clauses in its contracts with direct business relationships and has a grievance mechanism for stakeholders to raise concerns and complaints regarding bribery and corruption.

Provide and promote decent work
The company has a publicly available policy statement committing it to respect the health and safety of workers in its operation and supply chain. It also discloses how it monitors the performance of its suppliers on health and safety standards. Moreover, the company discloses the proportion of its total direct operations workforce covered by collective bargaining agreements as well as the proportion of women for each employee category. Additionally, it discloses a target to increase female representation to 50% in its total workforce and to 38% in leadership positions by 2027. The company currently has 30% women on its Board of Directors.

Respect human rights
The company has a publicly available policy statement committing it to respect human rights and the ILO fundamental rights at work in its operations. It also has a human rights grievance mechanism accessible to all workers and external stakeholders who may be adversely impacted by the company.

Lobbying
The company does not report on its lobbying and advocacy practices on nature-related issues, nor whether these activities align with its sustainability strategy.

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 frequency and channels, for engaging with stakeholder groups beyond materiality assessment.

Sustainability strategy and accountability
The company has an opportunity to disclose its process for identifying and prioritising its most relevant sustainability topics and impacts. Also, it discloses some sustainability objectives/targets including water. However, there is an opportunity to establish group-wide targets for the most material parts of its value chain and report consistently against all its targets. Additionally, while the company states it has a corporate social responsibility committee who is responsible for implementation of its corporate social responsibility strategy, it could disclose whether its corporate social responsibility strategy covers both environmental and social strategy. Furthermore, it has an opportunity to link performance criteria in senior executives’ remuneration policies to targets and objectives which cover nature, including biodiversity, and social issues. Lastly, the company could improve its transparency by disclosing whether its highest governance body has expertise with respect to the company’s most material sustainability topics.

Ecosystem conversion and restoration
No evidence was found regarding the company’s efforts to avoid ecosystem conversion, including deforestation, or promote restoration. The company has an opportunity to develop a strategy and publicly report on specific, time-bound targets.

GHG emissions
The company should set time-bound targets to reduce its scope 1, 2 and 3 greenhouse gas emissions as well as report progress against them. Crucially, the company needs to reduce its scope 1,2 and 3 emissions and its targets need to align with a 1.5-degree trajectory.

Impact and dependencies assessment
The company has an opportunity to disclose assessments of its impacts on nature, including biodiversity, within its own operations and in its supply chain. It also has the opportunity to disclose its dependencies on nature within its own operations and upstream business relationships.

Invasive species
The company has not identified any activities that could lead to the introduction of invasive alien species in its own operations.

Key areas and species
The company has an opportunity to disclose locations within or adjacent to areas important for biodiversity, both in its own operations and its supplier locations. It could also disclose existing species populations existing in or adjacent to both its own and its suppliers’ locations, as well as the conservation status of species identified at its own sites according to national and international lists.

Resource exploitation and circularity performance
No evidence was found regarding the company’s efforts to work towards a circular economy or which organisms it exploits. The company has an opportunity to develop a strategy and publicly report on specific, time-bound targets.

Solid and air pollution
The company does not disclose relevant information related to pollution in its operations or supply chains.

Water
The company does not disclose relevant information related to water, in its operations or supply chains.

Indigenous Peoples’ and land rights
The company does not show if it is committed to respecting Indigenous Peoples’ rights or land rights of local communities.

Safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment
Although the company states that it has an unwavering commitment to leadership and continuous improvement in environmental, health and safety procedures for the benefit of the communities where it conducts business, it has an opportunity to commit to respecting local communities’ right to a safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment. It could also commit to zero tolerance for acts of violence, threats, intimidation or judicial harassment committed against land and environmental rights defenders. Moreover, it should track its actual or potential negative impacts on the health of local communities.

Act ethically
The company has an opportunity to disclose a policy on bribery and corruption and its processes for identifying its bribery and corruption risks and impacts in specific locations or activities covering its own operations. It could also disclose a publicly available policy statement that specifies that it does not make political contributions, its expenditures on lobbying activities, and 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 a time-bound target for paying all workers a living wage or that it has achieved paying all workers a living wage, and describe 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 add a requirement for them to pay a living wage, and disclose how it supports the payment. Moreover, it could disclose public commitment to gender equality and women’s empowerment and 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 expects its suppliers to respect specific workers’ rights but has an opportunity to reference all the ILO fundamental rights at work.  It could describe a comprehensive process for assessing and identifying human rights risks and impacts across all its activities and supply chain, and its salient human rights issues. Also, the company could specify what it considers to be salient human rights issues, how relevant factors are considered such as geographical, economic and social factors, and how it acts to prevent, mitigate or remediate its salient human rights issues through a global system.