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How Serious Is Walmart's Sustainable Food Push?

An organic food label at a Walmart store

Big Talk



Walmart this week rolled out a new initiative aimed at creating "a more sustainable food system," but critics say such efforts amount to little more than a clever public relations strategy.

In a press release, Walmart president and chief executive officer Doug McMillon trumpeted the company's pledge to heal the global food system.

"The future of food is absolutely critical for both our society and for our business, which means we have a huge opportunity to make a difference here."

The company announced it would take steps to reduce the overall "true cost" of food, increase access to healthy food, improve food safety and increase transparency about its suppliers and producers.

In terms of impact on the food system, Walmart is the heaviest of heavyweights. The company garners one out of every four dollars that that Americans spend on groceries, and controls more than half of the grocery market for the 40 top metro areas in the U.S.

In the Details



The company's new initiative sounds pretty good on the surface. But its press statements are short on specifics and measurable goals. Walmart vows to provide nutrition education to 4 million U.S. households starting in 2015. There's no talk of when they expect to reach this goal, or how they'll achieve it.

The environmental "pillar" of this new initiative is its Climate Smart Agriculture Platform, which the company says will "increase visibility" of agricultural impacts over the next decade.

Touting food donations amounting to 1.58 billion pounds since 2010, the company said it aims to provide 4 billion "healthier meals to those who need them in the U.S. over the next five years."

Stacy Mitchell, a senior researcher with the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, said while there's no way to know for sure whether the company will follow through with this week's moves, history has shown a great gap between the company's talk and its walk.

This is greenwashing, but it's a more sophisticated version of greenwashing than we've seen other companies employ in the past.


"This is Walmart's pattern. A few times a year, they make these kinds of announcements, and because they're a big company and the announcements seem sweeping and broad, they often get a tremendous amount of coverage," Mitchell said. "But what we don't see, really, is nearly the same kind of coverage from reporters going back and looking to see, ‘ok they said this, what did they really do?'"

Broken Promises



The company's track record on environmental promises is spotty. In 2010, Walmart said it would trim 20 million metric tons of greenhouse gasses from its supply chain by the end of 2015. By its own reporting, it has reduced only 7.55 million metric tons so far.

The company has been talking about switching to 100 percent renewable power sources for nearly a decade. Walmart reports that 24 percent of its energy now comes from renewables, though only 3% of the portfolio comes from wind and solar projects, which is down from 4 percent last year.

"This is greenwashing, but it's a more sophisticated version of greenwashing than we've seen other companies employ in the past," Mitchell said.

She said in 2005, Walmart was facing grassroots opposition on about 1 out of every 3 if its store proposals, many of those campaigns successfully blocking or delaying plans. After a rigorous series of announcements like the one this week, the company has grown by 39 percent since it first launched its sustainability campaign nearly a decade ago. According to Zogby poll numbers, Walmart's "unfavorable" ratings stood at 38 percent in 2005. According to Walmart data, 20 percent of people held that view in 2010.

Still, the company has struggled to convince environmental groups like ILSR and Food and Water Watch, which note that Walmart builds energy-hungry buildings, threatens sustainable local food systems and specializes in cheap products that increase waste.

"They do make these improvements on things -- they're modest improvements -- but they're improvements on things like product packaging and store energy efficiency, but meanwhile they're using the goodwill that they generate from that to grow their business significantly, and as Walmart grows, it has a highly environmentally destructive business model," she said.

"What you have is one step forward in order to enable ten steps back."

Read More:



  • Walmart Aims To Go Greener On Food (New York Times)
  • Walmart's Quest For Low-Cost And Environmentally Friendly Food (The Guardian)
  • Walmart Wants To Make Food More Sustainable-but Don't Confuse a Pledge With Practice (TakePart)


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