Hormel Foods

Lobbying
Hormel Foods discloses a list of trade associations of which it is a member. It has however an opportunity to show further leadership by disclosing a full list for all geographies where it operates.

Stakeholder engagement
The company discloses an overview of the issues raised during its stakeholder engagement activities along with frequency and channels it uses to engage with its stakeholder groups.

Resource exploitation and circularity performance
The company discloses activities to improve soil health or agrobiodiversity in its production or sourcing practices, including setting expectations in the supply chain.

Solid and air pollution
The company demonstrates commitment and partakes in activities related to plastic use reduction and transitioning towards sustainable packaging.

Water
The company has a time-bound target to reduce water withdrawal in its own operations and reports progress against the target. The company reports how much water is withdrawn for its own operations in water-stressed areas. The company demonstrates reducing water withdrawal in its own operations.

Indigenous Peoples’ and land rights
The company has a requirement for its business relationships to identify and acknowledge Indigenous Peoples who may be affected by their projects. It also emphasizes the importance of obtaining the free, prior, and informed consent of these Indigenous Peoples in determining whether and how to proceed with the projects.

Act ethically
The company has a policy prohibiting bribery and corruption, and includes anti-bribery and anti-corruption clauses in its contracts with direct business relationships. It also has a grievance mechanism for stakeholders to raise concerns and complaints regarding bribery and corruption. Moreover, the company discloses its lobbying expenditures.

Provide and promote decent work
The company has a publicly available policy statement committing to respect the heath and safety of workers in its operations and supply chain. Additionally, the company discloses the proportion of its total direct operations workforce covered by collective bargaining agreements. It also discloses the proportion of its total direct operations workforce for each employee category by age group. Moreover, it reports the proportion of women in its total direct operations workforce for each employee category, divulges that it has 33.33% women on the board, and sets a target to increase the number of women in salaried roles by 25% by 2025. The company has 33.33% women on the board.

Respect human rights
The company has a publicly available policy statement committing it to respect human rights and the ILO core labors rights at work. Moreover, it indicates that it has a human rights grievance mechanism accessible to all workers, as well as all external stakeholders who may be adversely impacted by the company.

Lobbying
The company 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.

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, while it discloses some sustainability objectives/targets including climate and social inclusion, it could establish group-wide targets for the most material parts of its value chain. Additionally, although the company reports consistently against all its targets, it could report quantitatively against all its targets. 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
While the company strives for sustainable agriculture that preserves biodiversity and requires its suppliers to protect high-value ecological areas, it still has the opportunity to assess its impacts on nature, including biodiversity, and disclose the methodology and results of these assessments within its own operations and upstream activities in its value chain. The company also has yet to disclose assessments of its dependencies on nature either within its own operations or in 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
The company 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
The company does not disclose relevant information related to pollution in its operations or supply chains.

Water
The company has an opportunity to engage with suppliers to reduce water withdrawals. The company does not disclose relevant information on water pollution or 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
While the company discloses a process for compliance on corruption and bribery risks, it could describe the process for identifying these risks and impacts in specific locations or activities covering its own operations. Moreover, the company discloses its political engagement approach in a policy statement, but it has an opportunity to have a policy setting out its lobbying approach and specifying that it does not make political contributions.

Provide and promote decent work
The company has an opportunity to disclose how it monitors the health and safety performance of its suppliers. Additionally, while the company states that it strives to provide a fair living wage, it could describe how it determines a living wage for each region, and set a related time-bound target or reveal that it has achieved this goal. Relatedly, 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, while the company is committed to promoting equal opportunities for all employees, it can explicitly commit to gender equality and women’s empowerment. It could further enhance transparency by disclosing information on the ratio of the basic salary and remuneration of women to men.

Respect human rights
The company has a publicly available policy statement committing it to respect specific workers’ rights but has an opportunity to reference all the ILO fundamental rights at work. Additionally, while the company conducts key topic assessments and due diligence in general, it has an opportunity to disclose the process for identifying its human rights risks and impacts in its operations and its supply chain. It could further describe its process for assessing and identifying what it considers to be its salient human rights issues. Moreover, while the company discloses that it requires suppliers to implement corrective actions on human and labour standards, it could disclose a global system to act on all its salient human rights issues in all its activities.