Colgate-Palmolive

Stakeholder engagement
The company discloses the channels through which it engages with each stakeholder group.

Sustainability strategy and accountability
The company discloses its process for identifying and prioritising its most relevant sustainability impacts, and reports progress against all the targets it has set.

Ecosystem conversion and restoration
The company indicates its commitment of no conversion of native vegetation for four of its major forest commodities: pulp and paper; palm oil and derivatives; soy and soy oil; and beef and beef tallow. The company discloses some activities to achieve conversion-free supply chains.

GHG emissions
The company discloses time-bound targets to reduce its scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions, and reports quantitative reductions against the targets for its scope 1 and 2 emissions. Its targets are aligned with the SBTi 1.5°C trajectory.

Resource exploitation and circularity performance
The company discloses the packaging footprint by weight, but has an opportunity to discloses a quantitative breakdown of all of its material inputs. The company discloses activities to improve soil health or agrobiodiversity in its production or sourcing practices.

Solid and air pollution
The company has a policy statement to eliminate the use of hazardous materials in its operations. It discloses a breakdown of hazardous waste directed to and diverted from disposal. The company discloses quantitative data with regards to plastic use reduction and use of sustainable packaging. The company discloses its target to reduce the absolute use of new plastic by one-third against a 2019 baseline. Further, it discloses the progress against the same. The company also discloses the proportion of recycled content in plastic packaging.

Water
The company demonstrates it is reducing water withdrawal in its own operations. The company engages with suppliers to reduce water withdrawal. The company discloses its processes for managing and monitoring discharge water quality. The company has a commitment to respect the right to water.

Indigenous Peoples’ and land rights
The company discloses its commitment to respect the legal or customary land-tenure and use rights of indigenous and local communities.

Safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment
The company provides a commitment to respect the right to a safe, healthy, and sustainable environment in the communities in which it operates.

Act ethically
The company has an anti-bribery policy that prohibits bribery and corruption involving third parties and states that non-compliance may result in the termination of the business relationship. It requires compliance with the Colgate-Palmolive Global Anti-Bribery Policy and applicable laws, including the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, by all third-party partners. Additionally, it offers multiple communication channels, including email, phone, facsimile, postal address, and an online reporting website, allowing stakeholders to raise concerns anonymously and without fear of reprisals. The company also publicly declares that it does not make political contributions, specifying that no company funds or assets are used for contributions to any political party or candidate.

Provide and promote decent work
The company commits to worker health and safety through a publicly available policy and expects similar standards from its business relationships, including third-party audits for high-risk suppliers and membership in Sedex for ethical trade compliance. It supports living wages by conducting global gender-based pay analyses, aiming for statistical equity. Commitment to gender equality is evident as subsidiaries in Thailand and Turkey signed the Women’s Empowerment Principles. The company promotes women’s advancement through various programs and aims to increase female management representation in its Indian subsidiary by 20% by 2025. It reports 40% female board representation.

Respect human rights
Colgate commits to respecting human rights through a publicly available policy approved by its highest governance body. The company upholds the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights and supports the Global Sullivan Principles, demonstrating its commitment across global operations.

Lobbying
While the company discloses one trade association that is aligned with the goals of the Paris Agreement, the company does not disclose a comprehensive list of the associations it belongs to, nor a clear and detailed framework for assessing alignment of its trade associations with its sustainability targets, including potential misalignment.

Stakeholder engagement
The company has an opportunity to disclose an overview of the issues raised during its stakeholder engagement activities.

Sustainability strategy and accountability
While the company discloses some sustainability targets, it has an opportunity to establish group-wide targets for the most material parts of its value chain. The company provides evidence of linking performance criteria in senior executives’ remuneration policies to its sustainability targets and objectives. However, the targets on which the remuneration depends are not explicitly stated. No evidence found that its highest governance body has expertise concerning the company’s most material pressures on nature.

Ecosystem conversion and restoration
The company does not have time-bound targets to achieve conversion-free supply chains. Additionally, it is not committed to restoring ecosystems and does not disclose details or outcomes of ecosystem restoration projects in areas affected by its own operations or those of its suppliers.

GHG emissions
The company reports an increase in its scope 3 emissions.

Impact and dependencies assessment
The company has not holistically assessed its impacts or how it depends on nature, including biodiversity. It has an opportunity to start such an assessment across its value chains, focused on quantification of its impacts or dependencies.

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 does not disclose key species or areas important for biodiversity affected by its operations or suppliers. It has an opportunity to increase its transparency.

Resource exploitation and circularity performance
The company does not report quantitatively on its group-wide circularity performance. The company has an opportunity to disclose a target to improve soil health in its production or sourcing practices and report progress against it.

Solid and air pollution
The company does not commit to avoiding the development or marketing of new chemicals or products with SVHC (substance of very high concern) properties. Additionally, it is not reducing the production of hazardous waste and does not report on the amount of plastic waste generated or the proportions directed to or diverted from disposal. It also does not report metrics on air pollutants, nor set time-bound targets to reduce them.

Water
While the company states a target to reduce water use, it is based on intensity and does not necessarily equate to absolute reduction. The company reports the range for the proportion of withdrawals from water-stressed areas across its operations, but not the explicit proportion of withdrawals. The company does not report a decrease in water pollution. The company does not regularly report on water pollution metrics, nor targets to reduce water pollution. The company has an opportunity to publicly commit to the right to water and to provide 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
The company does not disclose its processes to identify and recognise the rights of Indigenous Peoples when activities in its own operations may impact their rights, and describes how it obtains Indigenous Peoples’ free, prior and informed consent. The company does not require its business relationships to have a process to identify legitimate tenure rights holders paying particular attention to vulnerable or marginalised tenure rights holders, and to negotiate with them to provide adequate compensation.

Safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment
No evidence found that the company tracks its actual or potential negative impacts on the health of local communities. While it states a zero tolerance or retaliation commitment against human rights defenders, it could broaden its scope to include acts of violence, threats, intimidation, or judicial harassment.

Act ethically
The company complies with anti-bribery laws and states non-contribution to political activities but does not provide a detailed engagement strategy. It lacks evidence of a comprehensive approach to identifying bribery risks. The company has an opportunity to disclose its lobbying expenditures and establish clear guidelines for third-party lobbyists.

Provide and promote decent work
The company discloses a range of health and safety metrics but lacks comprehensive hours worked data for all employees. It asserts that it provides wages meeting basic needs and legal standards but does not verify these as living wages nor outline a strategy for living wage determination and support in its supply chain. While it reports wage parity for a subsidiary in India, it lacks broader gender salary ratio disclosures. The company has conducted a pay analysis showing pay equity but does not publicly commit to gender equality and empowerment, evidenced by low female board representation. The company has an opportunity to improve disclosures on total hours worked, define and support living wage standards comprehensively, and strengthen its commitment to gender equality with specific targets and broader disclosures.

Respect human rights
The company commits to prohibiting child labour, forced labour, and discrimination, and it has policies respecting lawful freedom of association and collective bargaining ‘in conformance with local law’. It suggests an adherence to ILO core conventions, yet lacks a robust formal policy statement regarding their full implementation universally. Although the company engages in social compliance audits through the SMETA protocol and has a Supplier Responsible Sourcing Assessment (SRSA) program, these efforts do not sufficiently describe the process for identifying human rights risks in operations and supply chains. The company has an opportunity to clearly define its commitment to universal human rights standards and improve transparency in its human rights risk assessment and mitigation processes.