Walmart Strengthens Sustainable Chemistry Commitment, Reports Progress in Safer Product Formulation
September 27 2017 - 9:00AM
Business Wire
Retailer sets new goal for 10 percent priority
chemical reduction by 2022
Walmart is strengthening its sustainable chemistry policy for
consumable products, reaffirming the company’s work to increase
transparency, advance improved product formulations, and offer a
larger sustainable product selection for customers.
As part of the policy expansion, Walmart aims to reduce its
consumables chemical footprint for Walmart and Sam’s Clubs U.S.
stores by 10 percent by 2022, becoming the first U.S. retailer to
set a time bound reduction goal. Consumables products include items
like household cleaners, cosmetics and skincare items, and infant
products, among others. The goal applies to chemicals defined by
the Walmart Priority Chemicals List in its revised commitment.
“We know our customers are interested in what goes into products
and how they are made. It’s important for them, and we are
advocating for them by encouraging innovation and transparency into
that process,” said Zach Freeze, senior director of strategic
initiatives for sustainability at Walmart. “Our strengthened
commitment provides more clarity on our expectations for suppliers
in working towards enhanced product formulations and setting
concrete benchmarks to check progress along the way.”
Last month, Walmart became the first retailer to participate in
the Chemical Footprint Project survey, and publicly reports its
progress annually through the Global Responsibility Report and
Sustainability Hub. To date, the retailer’s suppliers have removed
96 percent of high priority chemicals by volume weight from the
consumables products sold in Walmart U.S. stores, up from 95
percent last year.
Walmart’s work in sustainable chemistry ladders up to its
aspirational goal to sell products that sustain people and natural
resources. This work was recently recognized by Fortune’s Change
the World Ranking, as the company was listed as number seven of
50 companies that are making social benefit part of their core
business.
“Walmart has set an industry precedent for targeting and
measuring reductions of chemicals of concern in its products,” said
Boma Brown-West, senior manager at the Environmental Defense
Fund (EDF). “Walmart demonstrates the Five Pillars of
Leadership on safer chemicals and encourages the pursuit of
safer products across the supply chain.”
The updates to Walmart’s commitment move beyond Walmart’s
measures already in place to promote transparency with clear
ingredient labeling and to encourage informed substitution with
chemicals of concern by reformulating products customers use in
their everyday lives, while maintaining the affordability they
expect.
“Like Walmart, we know that today’s consumers want more
information to help them make informed choices,” said Jack
McAneny, director of sustainability at Procter & Gamble Co.
(P&G). “That’s why we’ve recently expanded our transparency
commitment to include fragrance ingredients across our product
portfolio.”
Other key updates to the Walmart sustainable chemistry
commitment include:
- Transparency: Although not a new
requirement, Walmart still holds the expectation that suppliers
will provide full ingredient disclosure of priority chemicals both
online and now on product packages starting in 2018. Walmart looks
to spur supplier transparency in cleaning products with new
ingredient information on packaging, enabling customers to simply
turn over the product and see ingredient information, in many ways
similar to what customers already see and expect for food, beauty
and personal care products.
- Enhanced Formulation: Walmart is
adding two new regulatory lists to its priority chemicals list to
better address fragrance allergens ingredients. In addition to its
new chemical footprint reduction goal, Walmart will also ask
suppliers to verify the purity of ingredients where contaminants of
concern may exist.
- More Sustainable Products:
Walmart looks to increase its assortment of sustainably formulated
products by encouraging use of two additional third party
verification programs that lend credibility to green chemistry and
safer substitutions. The Cradle to Cradle (silver level and above)
and EWG Verified programs are being recognized as aligning with
Walmart’s commitment along with EPA Safer Choice. Additionally,
Walmart is expanding the scope of its original private brand
expectations to now include national brands.
Background
Walmart’s sustainable chemistry commitment, originally launched
in 2013, covers approximately 90,000 products from 700 suppliers.
Walmart consumables products include items like household cleaners,
cosmetics and skincare items, and infant products, among
others.
The retailer worked with a variety of stakeholders — suppliers,
Environmental Defense Fund, EPA and others — to develop its
sustainable chemistry commitment and a system for tracking and
monitoring progress. By working with these stakeholders and
reviewing a range of authoritative and regulatory lists, Walmart
landed on a list of priority and high priority chemicals for
targeted reduction.
Last year, Walmart released the list of high priority chemicals
and for the first time outlined its progress to date on eliminating
these substances from the products sold on store shelves. The
company reports on progress in its Global Responsibility
Report.
For more information on the Walmart Sustainable Chemistry
Policy, please visit the Walmart Sustainability Hub.
About Walmart
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE: WMT) helps people around the world
save money and live better - anytime and anywhere - in retail
stores, online, and through their mobile devices 260 million
customers and members visit our more than 11,600 stores under 59
banners in 28 countries and e-commerce websites in 11 countries.
With fiscal year 2017 revenue of $485.9 billion, Walmart employs
approximately 2.3 million associates worldwide. Walmart continues
to be a leader in sustainability, corporate philanthropy and
employment opportunity. Additional information about Walmart can be
found by visiting http://corporate.walmart.com, on Facebook at
http://facebook.com/walmart and on Twitter at
http://twitter.com/walmart.
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Walmart Media RelationsMicah Ragland,
1-800-331-0085news.walmart.com/reporter
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