CF Industries

Lobbying
CF Industries lists its membership of association.

Stakeholder engagement
CF Industries discloses an overview of the issues raised during its stakeholder engagement activities. Furthermore, its stakeholder engagement covers nature, nutrition, and social issues.

Sustainability strategy and accountability
CF Industries reports consistently against all its targets.

GHG emissions
CF Industries discloses its scope 3 emissions and has a target to reduce Scope 3 emissions by 10% by 2030 against a baseline year of 2020. Further, it discloses its goal to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.

Key areas and species
CF Industries evaluates its sites with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Biodiversity Risk Filter tool, revealing no operations near protected or high biodiversity areas. It also discloses biodiversity risks for manufacturing and distribution locations and provides the conservation status of species identified at its locations.

Resource exploitation and circularity performance
CF Industries discloses activities to improve soil health or agrobiodiversity in its production or sourcing practices.

Solid and air pollution
CF Industries reports regularly on air quality parameters of emissions of harmful air pollutants.

Water
CF Industries discloses its processes for managing and monitoring discharge water quality. The company discloses that none of its withdrawals were from areas with high water stress, based upon cross-referencing of the facility withdrawal areas against the World Resources Institute (WRI) Aqueduct Water Risk Atlas and the WWF Water Risk Filter. Finally, the company demonstrates reducing water withdrawal in its own operations.

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

Act ethically
CF Industries discloses that its Vice President of Tax, who reports to the Chief Financial Officer, is responsible for its global tax strategy. It has a policy prohibiting bribery and corruption, includes anti-bribery and anti-corruption clauses in its contracts with direct business relationships, and provides a grievance mechanism for stakeholders to raise concerns and complaints regarding bribery and corruption.

Provide and promote decent work
CF Industries has publicly available policy statements committing to the respect of health and safety for both its own workers and those of its business relationships. It discloses how it monitors the health and safety performance of its business partners and reveals that it pays all workers in the US and Canada a living wage. The company provides data on the proportion of its total direct operations workforce covered by collective bargaining agreements, broken down by age group, gender, and race or ethnicity for each employee category. Additionally, the company has set a time-bound target to achieve 30% representation of females and persons of color in senior leadership roles by 2025.

Respect human rights
CF Industries has a publicly available policy statement committing to the respect of human rights and indicates that it provides a human rights grievance mechanism accessible to all workers as well as to external stakeholders who may be adversely impacted by the company’s activities.

Lobbying
CF Industries has an opportunity to disclose a clear and detailed framework for assessing alignment of its trade associations with its sustainability targets and to report (potential) misalignments.

Stakeholder engagement
CF Industries has an opportunity to disclose its process, including channels and frequency, for engaging with stakeholder groups beyond its materiality assessment.

Sustainability strategy and accountability
While CF Industries states that it conducts a materiality assessment, it has an opportunity to disclose its process for identifying and prioritising its most relevant sustainability topics and impacts, including how external stakeholders are involved in the process. Also, the company discloses some sustainability objectives/targets including social inclusion and climate. However, there is an opportunity to establish group-wide targets for the most material parts of its value chain. Furthermore, although the company discloses a remuneration policy related to sustainability and climate, it could link this policy to improvement in nature-related objectives and social issues. Lastly, the company states that the board of directors has expertise in sustainability. However, it could improve its transparency by disclosing whether its highest governance body has expertise with respect to the company’s most material sustainability topics including nutrition, climate, water, soil health, social inclusion, ecosystem conversion and biodiversity.

Ecosystem conversion and restoration
CF Industries discloses some evidence of addressing conversion. However, this does not guarantee DCF-aligned practices. The company does not have time-bound targets to achieve conversion-free supply chains, and is not committed to restoring ecosystems. Finally, CF Industries does not disclose details and outcomes of ecosystem restoration projects in areas affected by its own operations or by its suppliers.

GHG emissions
CF Industries discloses its target to reduce carbon emissions intensity by 25% by 2030 and to be net zero carbon by 2050. However, it does not disclose whether it covers scope 1 and scope 2 emissions in its net zero target. Also, it discloses that there is an increase in its direct Scope 1 and indirect Scope 2 emissions against previous year. Then, the company should set time-bound targets to reduce its scope 1 and 2 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
While CF Industries is committed to environmental stewardship, works with third parties for biodiversity impact assessments, and participates in the IFA Biodiversity Taskforce, it has an opportunity to disclose the methodology and full results of these assessments. The company also maps biodiversity risk levels for its manufacturing and distribution locations. However, it has the chance to assess and disclose its impacts and dependencies on nature, including biodiversity, both within its own operations and its upstream business relationships.

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

Key areas and species
CF Industries reports the number of species identified by the IUCN Red List near multiple sites. However, there is no proof that the company reveals the names of all species present in or around its sites. Furthermore, the company does not reveal the locations of its suppliers that are situated in or near regions critical for biodiversity. Additionally, the company does not provide information on the populations of species found in or around its suppliers’ locations.

Resource exploitation and circularity performance
CF Industries has an opportunity to disclose its inputs according to an international standard, and to report quantitatively on its group-wide circularity performance. The company also has an opportunity to disclose a target to improve soil health in its production or sourcing practices and to report progress against it.

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

Water
CF Industries has an opportunity to set targets and engage with suppliers to reduce water withdrawal, and to reduce water pollution beyond compliance and set targets to do the same. The company does not disclose a commitment to respect the right to water, nor does it disclose its processes for implementing preventive and corrective action plans for identified specific risks to the right to water and sanitation in its own operations.

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

Safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment
CF Industries states that it is committed to complying with all applicable environmental laws and regulations, and also strives to promote environmental concerns and initiatives among all its stakeholders, including the communities in which it operates. Further, it discloses that it promotes the safety and health of its community and environment. However, no evidence found that the company has a commitment to respect the right to a safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment of local communities. Furthermore, the company has an opportunity to commit to zero tolerance for acts of violence, threats, intimidation or judicial harassment committed against land and environmental rights defenders and should track its actual or potential negative impacts on the health of local communities.

Act ethically
CF Industries could describe its process for identifying bribery and corruption risks and impacts in its own operations and specific locations. While its Code of Corporate Conduct outlines the company’s approach to lobbying and political engagement, there is an opportunity to formalize this in a public policy document. The company states it makes political contributions where legally permissible, but could further disclose if these are exceptional cases and the criteria involved. Although the company provides some information on lobbying expenditures, it could either disclose these for all locations where it lobbies or specify that it is limited to certain regions. Additionally, the company has the opportunity to require third-party lobbyists to comply with its lobbying and political engagement policy.

Provide and promote decent work
CF Industries has an opportunity to disclose its methodology for determining a living wage in the regions where it operates, and while it has set wage expectations for its suppliers, it could require them to pay a living wage and detail how it supports this requirement. Although the company has a statement on gender equality and women’s empowerment, it has the opportunity to formalize this stance in a public policy document. The company reveals that 23.08% of its board is composed of women and discloses the mean and median gender pay gap for its UK operations, but it has not yet disclosed the ratio of basic salary and remuneration between women and men in its total direct operations workforce, categorized by employee type and location.

Respect human rights
CF Industries discloses commitments to respect the ILO’s fundamental rights at work but could strengthen these into formal commitments. It expects its suppliers to respect specific workers’ rights but has an opportunity to reference all ILO fundamental rights. While the company states it has conducted a modern slavery risk assessment of its suppliers, there is no evidence it describes the process for identifying human rights risks in specific locations or activities, either in its own operations or through business relationships. The company has the opportunity to describe its process for assessing salient human rights issues, disclose the results of its human rights risk assessment, and present a global system to manage these concerns effectively.