Group items tagged

Supply chain data gaps have inspired numerous industry-led initiatives dedicated to massive supply chain data-gathering and sharing projects, such as the Sustainable Apparel Coalition (SAC), and it has inspired dozens of cloud services specializing in traceability, ranging from EcoVadis to SourceMap. And barely one month into 2018, several of these tools are attaining new levels of maturity and transparency.

Patagonia will use 100 percent traceable down across its entire collection of down-insulated products starting in the Fall 2014 season, the outdoor apparel company says.

Unilever has pledged that by the end of 2014, all of the palm oil the company buys globally will be traceable to known sources.

Norpac Fisheries Export is one of several companies that has found it profitable -- as well as environmentally helpful -- to track seafood catches along their entire supply chain and make sure they were not caught using illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) practices. Norpac's tracking system "actually saves us time and money," Managing Director Thomas Kraft said.

But the fact is that the blockchain is building some serious credibility within the world's biggest banks and financial services firms - they helped fuel more than $1 billion in investments between 2014 and 2016. That visibility has given both established and emerging companies the confidence to experiment. In mid-October, for example, Walmart announced a collaboration with IBM and Tsinghua University in Beijing focused on using the blockchain as a mechanism for authenticating food sources and keeping tabs on all sorts of related data - including the originating farm, batch numbers, processing plant information, expiration dates and storage temperatures.

Mislabeled seafood products have become a widespread problem: Recent studies have found that 30 percent of seafood products are mislabelled and that such errors have led to significant distrust in labels among consumers. Meanwhile, DNA test results have reinforced that the Marine Stewardship Council's (MSC's) ecolabel provides credible traceability.

Mars will require all of its suppliers to provide palm oil from traceable sources by the end of 2015. The company already purchases 100% sustainable palm oil as certified by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil.

The Palm Oil Innovation Group (POIG), as the group is known, unveiled its standards during the annual meeting of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), the industry's main certification body. The standards build on criteria set by the RSPO by adding stricter requirements "to ensure that there is a supply of traceable palm oil free from forest and peatland destruction and human rights abuses," according to a statement from Greenpeace, one of POIG's charter members.  Read more at http://news.mongabay.com/2013/1118-poig-palm-oil.html#wlI8Y8ZEEyKQzKTU.99

Colgate-Palmolive issued a new Policy on No Deforestation, which commits the company to sustainably sourcing pulp, paper, palm oil, soy, and beef tallow. The company also pledged to achieve full traceability of its palm oil supply chain by 2015 under the policy.

Mondelēz International released a sustainable palm oil action plan that requires its suppliers to achieve full traceability by the end of 2015. The policy also requires suppliers to publish their sustainable sourcing practices and implementation timelines.

Industry collaboration and traceability are among the top supply chain sustainability trends, according to an Ethical Corporation whitepaper.

Colgate-Palmolive has issued a new Policy on No Deforestation, including a pledge to achieve full traceability of its palm oil supply back to the plantation by 2015.

Danone pledged to develop a fully traceable palm oil supply chain with no links to deforestation. The company will work with the Forest Trust to map its entire palm oil supply chain by the end of 2015.

Institutional investors representing over half a trillion dollars in assets under management are calling on four major palm oil producers to adopt an immediate moratorium on deforestation and join the growing effort within the industry to establish traceable, deforestation-free palm oil supply chains. Led by Green Century Capital Management, investors called on the companies to cease their efforts to weaken the existing threshold for no-deforestation.

The North Face today announced its Fall 2016 line, including more than 500 down product styles that feature certified responsible down through the Responsible Down Standard (RDS). Officially launched in January 2014, the RDS is the most comprehensive, global, third-party certified animal welfare and traceability standard for down and feathers available for use by any company. The North Face initially committed to include 100 percent certified responsible down in all retail and wholesale down products by Fall 2017, and was able to achieve the increase a year sooner than anticipated. 

Largely recognized as a furniture retailer, IKEA also derives revenue from its store-based restaurants, where the company says it is working to make sustainable, affordable, transparent, traceable and animal welfare-friendly practices the norm.

Forget the romantic image of a lonely fisherman chasing his catch on the open water. Fishing supply chains have become sprawling, technology-driven operations rife with overfishing and human rights abuses.