Tyson Foods

Sustainability strategy and accountability
Tyson Foods discloses its process for identifying and prioritising its most relevant sustainability impacts as well as the outcome of this process, in relation to its sustainability strategy.

Ecosystem conversion and restoration
Tyson Foods discloses some activities to achieve conversion-free supply chains.

GHG emissions
The company has set a time-bound targets to reduce its scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas emissions and reports progress against them.

Resource exploitation and circularity performance
Tyson Foods discloses which organisms it directly exploits for commercial uses, including wild animal and plant species. Furthermore, the company discloses activities to improve soil health or agrobiodiversity in its production or sourcing practices.

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

Water
The company reports how much water is withdrawn for its own operations in water-stressed areas.

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

Act ethically
Tyson Foods maintains a policy that prohibits bribery and corruption, and integrates anti-bribery and anti-corruption clauses into contracts with direct business relationships. Additionally, the company offers a grievance mechanism for stakeholders to raise concerns and complaints regarding bribery and corruption.

Furthermore, the company discloses its approach to lobbying and political engagement within a policy statement.

Provide and promote decent work
Tyson Foods presents a public policy statement in which it pledges to uphold worker health and safety. This commitment extends to its business relationships.

Furthermore, the company discloses the distribution of its workforce across various employee categories by age group and gender. Additionally, it reports a 30.76% representation of women on the board.

Respect human rights
Tyson Foods has a publicly available policy statement committing it to respect human rights and the ILO fundamental rights at work in its operations and supply chain. Moreover, the company indicates it has a human rights grievance mechanism accessible to all workers and external stakeholders who may be adversely impacted by the company.

Lobbying
Tyson Foods discloses a list of trade associations. However, it has an opportunity to show further leadership by disclosing a list of trade associations of which it is a member for all jurisdictions in which it operates. The company also 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 discloses some sustainability objectives/targets including climate and nutrition. However, there is an opportunity to establish group-wide targets for the most material parts of its value chain. Also, while the company reports consistently against some targets including climate and soil health, it has an opportunity to report consistently against all its targets. Furthermore, although the company briefly discloses a remuneration policy related to social issues, it could link this policy to improvement in nature-related objectives and specific 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.

Stakeholder engagement
Tyson Foods discloses an overview of the issues raised during its regular and ongoing stakeholder engagement activities as well as the engagement channels, for each stakeholder group. However, to enhance better transparency, it could further clarify whether the topics listed under area of focus are raised by the stakeholders.

Ecosystem conversion and restoration
The company does not have a commitment to ensure zero conversion, and it does not have time-bound targets to achieve conversion-free supply chains. Furthermore, it 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 should set time-bound targets to reduce its scope 3 emissions and report progress against it. Additionally, its scope 1, 2 and 3 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
While the company claims to minimize impacts on threatened species and habitats, it has an opportunity to be more transparent by disclosing the species that exist in or adjacent to its own locations, along with their status on national and international conservation lists. Additionally, it could identify its operational and supplier sites that are situated in or near areas of significant biodiversity.

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. It has an opportunity to develop a strategy and publicly report on specific, time-bound targets.

Solid and air pollution
The company is not disclosing information about the production of hazardous substances and waste. While it describes its activities to reduce plastic use and transition towards sustainable packaging, it has an opportunity to disclose the associated quantitative data, including the amount of plastic waste generated and proportions directed from or to disposal. Additionally, it could start reporting on the emissions of harmful air pollutants and outline specific, time-bound targets for reducing air pollutants throughout its value chain.

Water
The company reports an increase in water withdrawal. While the company has targets related to water intensity, it has an opportunity to set a time-bound target to reduce water withdrawal. The company does not disclose relevant information on water pollution. The company has an opportunity to disclose relevant information on water withdrawal. The company has an opportunity to report water pollution metrics and set targets to reduce them. The company does not disclose relevant information related to water, in its operations or supply chains. The company does not disclose a commitment to respect the right to water. The company does not 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
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 has an opportunity to describe the process it employs to identify bribery and corruption risks and impacts within its own operations. Furthermore, while the company states that it allows political contribution aligned with the company’s objective and in compliance with relevant laws, there is a potential to disclose the approving entity for political contributions. It could also clarify whether such contributions are made only by exception and disclose the criteria guiding these exceptions. Moreover, although the company discloses some information regarding its federal lobbying expenses and corporate contributions, it could report lobbying expenditures in all locations where it carries out lobbying activities.

Provide and promote decent work
While the company discloses that it audits its suppliers, it could disclose how it monitors health and safety performance of its suppliers. In addition, despite the company stating that it pays minimum wage to its employees, it has an opportunity to commit to paying a living wage by setting a time-bound target. It could also elaborate on its methods to determine a living wage for its operational regions. Relatedly, while the company has set expectations on the wage paid by its suppliers, it could add a requirement for them to pay a living wage, and disclose its mechanism for supporting this payment.

Moreover, although the company is committed to diversity, it could explicitly commit to gender equality and women’s empowerment. Transparency may be heightened by reporting data such as the ratio of the basic salary and remuneration of women to men. Additionally, while reporting a 28% women representation in management for FY2021, it can introduce new time-bound targets.

Respect human rights
While the company conducts materiality risk assessments to identify risks to business, it has an opportunity to disclose how it identifies human rights risks and impacts across its operations and supply chain. In addition, the company could elaborate on the process for assessing and identifying its salient human rights issues. Moreover, while the company discloses that it undertakes measures to prevent and mitigate risks, it could disclose a global system to act on all its salient human rights issues and explain how the system applies to its supply chain.