According to president and CEO Doug McMillon, Walmart will be entering a “new era of trust and transparency” over the next few years. Revealed at the Net Impact Conference in Philadelphia last week, the retailer’s new roadmap will guide the company’s role in society on critical issues.
The plan adds new points to Walmart’s sustainability agenda and contains new commitments to its impact on surrounding communities and the planet.
The retail giant notes that in the upcoming years, it will double its sales of locally-grown produce across the U.S., expand sustainable sourcing to cover 20 key products, including bananas, coffee and tea, and implement a new plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
This makes Walmart the first retailer with an emissions-reduction plan approved by the Science Based Targets Initiative. Under the approved plan, the company will use energy-efficiency measures and will source half of its energy needs from renewable sources to achieve an 18 per cent reduction of emissions by 2025.
Moreover, it will work with suppliers to reduce emissions by 1 Gigaton by 2030, equivalent to taking more than 211 million passenger vehicles off of U.S. roads and highways for a year.
Walmart will also provide hundreds of thousands of its American associates to move from entry-level positions to jobs with more responsibility and higher pay by the end of next year. Moreover, it pledges to take a leadership role in promoting ethical recruitment and treatment of workers in the global retail supply chain.
“We want to make sure Walmart is a company that our associates and customers are proud of – and that we are always doing right by them and by the communities they live in,” says McMillon.
