Sustainable agricultural sourcing

Our agricultural supply chain

Agricultural crops make up two-thirds of our raw materials. Our business is linked to a complex network of thousands of smallholder farmers, large agri-businesses and third-party suppliers. We also buy ingredients from the agricultural commodity markets.

Security of supply is therefore a core business issue, especially when agricultural production is under threat from a number of factors, including changing weather patterns, water scarcity and unsustainable farming practices.

Unilever's aim

Our long-term aim is to buy all our agricultural raw materials from sustainable sources, so that:

• Farmers and farm workers can obtain an income they can live on and improve their living conditions

• Soil fertility is maintained and improved

• Water availability and quality are protected and enhanced

• Nature and biodiversity are protected and enhanced.

Our share of world volume 2008 (estimate)

Our approach

Unilever sources a wide range of agricultural raw materials for its products. We have focused our efforts on those crops where we purchase significant volumes such as those shown in the chart above. This is where we have the greatest impact and also where we have the opportunity to make a difference.

We established our Sustainable Agriculture Programme over ten years ago. In that time we have developed detailed guidelines on what sustainable agriculture means for our key crops – what we call Good Agricultural Practice Guidelines.

Working in partnership with an external advisory board and expert agronomists, we based these Guidelines on 11 indicators including water, energy, pesticide use, biodiversity, social capital and animal welfare.

See more on our approach here.

Progress in 2008

• Sustainable tea

Lipton has committed to source the tea for all its tea bags from Rainforest Alliance Certified TM farms by 2015. We are working with Rainforest Alliance, an international environmental organisation, to ensure that all the farms we source from are certified.  Although the pledge was only announced in 2007, more than 30 estates have already achieved this certification, including Unilever's own estates in Kenya and Tanzania and third-party suppliers in India and Argentina. By the end of 2008 around 50% of Lipton Yellow Label and PG Tips tea sold in Western Europe came from Rainforest Alliance Certified TM farms.

Read our Sustainable tea page for more.

• Sustainable palm oil

During 2008 we reached an important milestone when we publicly committed to source all our palm oil from certified sustainable sources by 2015. This commitment builds on our long-standing work on sustainable palm oil. In November, Unilever bought a part of the first consignment of palm oil certified by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil.

See our Sustainable palm oil page for more.

• Cage-free eggs

In 2008 our Hellmann's, Amora and Calvé brands announced their commitment to source only cage-free eggs for products sold in Western Europe.  This equates to removing over 1.7 million hens from battery cages. 

See our Other ingredients page for more.

Working with smallholder farmers

In addition to our large suppliers, many smallholder farmers form part of our agricultural supply chain. These farmers are often on uncertain incomes, and struggle to access capital and the right information to improve the efficiency of their growing techniques. They are also subject to price volatility and varying demand. Given our experience of sourcing from around 100 000 such farmers, this is an area where we can make a difference.

• Training smallholder tea farmers in Kenya

Unilever participated in a joint initiative with the Kenya Tea Development Agency (KTDA), the UK's Department for International Development and Wageningen University in the Netherlands to train smallholder farmers in sustainable tea cultivation. The three-year project concluded in December 2008, showing that there is the potential for a 5–15% improvement in profitability through increased yields and reduced farm inputs. 

• Creating new sources of supply

Allanblackia trees grow largely in the wild in Central, East and West Africa and have traditionally been harvested on a subsistence basis. Allanblackia seeds produce an oil that is ideal for use in our spreads. We invested in a programme to scale up production in partnership with non-profit groups and local government. New trees were planted on small rural farms, boosting local incomes and creating a completely new source of supply for our business.

See our Economic development page for more.

Supplier assessments

We are asking our third-party suppliers of fruit and vegetables to complete self-assessments against our Guidelines. In 2008, 74 of these (around a third of the number we expect to work with by 2010) registered on our electronic system to store and track their performance against our 11 sustainable agriculture indicators. 

We also implemented a new online tool to help our supply managers assess sustainability-related risks and opportunities in different countries when making decisions about sourcing.

Water & sustainable agriculture

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), agriculture is the largest user of the world's freshwater in most countries, accounting for 70% of freshwater withdrawals. However, there is already unprecedented pressure on the world's water resources due to a growing global population, increasing standards of living, and climate change including changing weather patterns.

For Unilever, this means that using sustainable agricultural practices will continue to be vital in securing sufficient water for future food production. Our Sustainable Agriculture team has worked on water management in more than ten pilot projects across 15 countries since 1997. The team's achievements are showcased in a recently published booklet describing their approach to sustainable water management in the production of agricultural raw materials. The publication covers water use and scarcity, implications for the business and how we work with growers and suppliers to use less water and protect water quality.