Conagra Brands

Lobbying
Conagra Brands discloses a list of trade associations of which it is a member wherever it operates.

Ecosystem conversion and restoration
Conagra Brands discloses some activities to achieve conversion-free supply chains.

GHG emissions
Conagra Brands has set time-bound targets to reduce its scope 1 and 2 emissions and reports progress against it.

Resource exploitation and circularity performance
Conagra Brands discloses activities to improve soil health or agrobiodiversity in its production or sourcing practices. The company has a target to improve soil health in its production or sourcing practices and reports progress against it.

Solid and air pollution
Conagra Brands demonstrates commitment, partakes in activities and discloses quantitative data related to plastic use reduction and transitioning towards sustainable packaging. It has also set a target regarding the reduction of overall plastic use, and reports progress against the targets.

Water
Conagra Brands reports how much water is withdrawn for its own operations in water-stressed areas and engages with suppliers to reduce water withdrawal. The company also discloses its tertiary, secondary and primary treatment plans for water quality discharge to improve water discharge quality.

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

Act ethically
Conagra Brands has a policy prohibiting bribery and corruption and a grievance mechanism for stakeholders to raise concerns and complaints regarding bribery and corruption. It also discloses a public commitment to protect personal data.

Provide and promote decent work
Conagra Brands has a publicly available policy statement in which it commits to respecting the health and safety of workers and expects its business relationships to uphold the same standard. The company provides transparency by disclosing various workforce-related metrics. This includes the proportion of its total direct operations workforce covered by collective bargaining agreements. Additionally, it discloses the proportion of its total direct operations workforce by age group, race, or ethnicity for each employee category and the proportion of women in its workforce for each employee category. Notably, the company has set a target to increase female representation in management-level roles by at least 40% by 2025.

Respect human rights
Conagra Brands has a publicly available policy statement committing it to respect human rights and indicates that it has a human rights grievance mechanism accessible to all workers and external stakeholders who may be adversely impacted by the company.

Lobbying
The company has an opportunity to report on its lobbying and advocacy practices on nature-related issues and 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
While the company states that it has a materiality assessment, it could disclose its process for identifying and prioritising its most relevant sustainability topics and impacts. This should include how external stakeholders are involved in the process and how regularly the assessment is undertaken. Also, the company discloses some sustainability objectives/targets including climate and soil health. However, there is an opportunity to establish group-wide targets for the most material parts of its value chain. Additionally, although the company reports consistently against some targets including climate and plastic, it has an opportunity to report consistently against all its targets. Furthermore, it could 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
The company does not have a commitment to ensure zero conversion, and while the company has a target to achieve conversion-free supply chains, certification models are not specified so there is no guarantee that it is DCF-aligned.
Furthermore, the company is not committed to restoring ecosystems and it does not disclose details and outcomes of ecosystem restoration projects in areas affected by its own operations or by its suppliers.

GHG emissions
The company discloses its target to reduce scope 3 emissions from purchased goods and services by 20% per metric ton of material sourced by 2030 as compared to the fiscal year 2020 baseline. However, no evidence found that the company has a target to reduce all its scope 3 emissions. The company should set time-bound targets to reduce its scope 3 emissions and report progress against them. Crucially, all its scope 1, 2 and 3 targets should 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 could also 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
While the company mentions efforts like planting erosion-reducing buffer zones by Birds Eye growers adjacent to rivers and lakes, it has yet to clarify whether these locations are in or adjacent to areas significant for biodiversity. The company could further improve transparency by disclosing the specific locations of its suppliers situated in or near important biodiversity zones. Additionally, sharing the status of species at both its own and its suppliers’ locations, according to international and national conservation lists, would enhance its biodiversity disclosures.

Resource exploitation and circularity performance
The company has an opportunity to disclose all its inputs according to an international standard and report quantitatively on its group-wide circularity performance.

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

Water
The company has an opportunity to disclose quantitative reductions in water withdrawals and to set time-bound targets to achieve the same. It could also improve on its disclosure on water pollution by disclosing water pollutant metrics and setting time-bound targets to reduce them. Additionally, the company could enhance its transparency by disclosing relevant information on rights 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
The company has an opportunity to commit to respecting local communities’ right to a safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment, and 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 could describe the process for identifying its bribery and corruption risks and impacts in specific locations or activities covering its own operations, and include anti-bribery and anti-corruption clauses in its contracts with business relationships. It could have a policy setting out its lobbying and political engagement approach and, although it states that it makes political contributions after approval from the Vice President & Chief Counsel of Marketing & Government Affairs, it could disclose that these are made only by exception and the criteria for making them. Furthermore, the company discloses some information regarding its lobbying expenditures but could disclose expenditures in all locations where it carries out lobbying activities or specify it only does so in specific countries or regions. It could also disclose that it requires 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. It could also 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. Additionally, it could describe how it monitors the health and safety performance of its suppliers and a public commitment to women’s empowerment. It could also disclose 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 has a publicly available policy statement committing it to respect specific workers’ rights in its operations and supply chain but has an opportunity to reference all the ILO fundamental rights at work. Furthermore, it could describe the process for identifying its human rights risks and impacts in specific locations or activities, covering its operations and supply chain. It could further disclose its process for assessing and identifying what it considers to be its salient human right risks, and its global system to act on, prevent or mitigate those risks.