biodiversity
As one of the country’s largest farmers, The Co-operative Group can have a direct impact on the UK’s biodiversity. We can also exert a significant impact through the products offered by The Co-operative Food.
As part of our new revolutionary Ethical Operating Plan:
• We will aim to be the UK’s leading retailer on forest protection, moving our palm oil and soya sourcing to a sustainable footing by 2011 and 2015 respectively, whilst maintaining our leading edge work on wood and paper.
• We will continue to maintain our position as one of the UK’s most responsible retailers of fish.
• We will extend our Plan Bee campaign and seek to address the decline of additional ‘at risk’ pollinators, and broaden our campaign against unconventional fossil fuels to encompass solutions such as community energy.
Find out more - Join the Revolution.
Plan Bee
We're campaigning to save the honeybee, and there are plenty of ways you can get involved, from planting bee-friendly wildflowers, to lobbying the government for better research. Find out how you can join the revolution to help
save the bee.
Marine stewardship
Globally, three quarters of commercial fish stocks are fully or overexploited, and nearly 90% of stocks of large predatory fish have already disappeared. The Co-operative Food has been a supporter of the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) since 1998. In August 2008, we launched a new Responsible Fish Sourcing Policy, which means that every own-brand fish product, including canned and sandwiches, has been rigorously checked to ensure it is responsibly sourced.
The policy addresses issues such as over-fishing, illegal fishing, bycatch, fishing methods that destroy the seabed, and the effect on other fish species, marine animals and birds. It also extends to farmed fish, which has to be sourced from farms working to agreed farm assurance standards. In January 2011, we announced that, by the end of 2013, we will source our own-brand canned tuna from fisheries employing the sustainable pole and line fishing method. Pole and line fishing is a selective way of catching tuna without the bycatch issues associated with other catch methods, and therefore has the potential to be the most environmentally and socially-sound method of fishing tuna.
To further support the development of a more sustainable UK fishing industry, we pledged £200,000 over two years to UK fisheries looking to pursue MSC certification and are backing the campaign to reduce the number of fish discarded in the seas around the UK. We're already working to reduce discards, by supporting the Cumbria Discard Reduction Programme, an innovative project co-ordinated by the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science (Cefas).
Forest stewardship
The Co-operative Food is a member of the WWF-UK Forest and Trade Network (FTN), and offers a range of Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified products, including barbecue charcoal and kitchenware. In 2007, The Co-operative Food became the first retailer to convert its entire own-brand household paper range to material that has been sourced from FSC-certified, responsibly managed forests and recycling facilities.
We also give consideration to FSC-certified timber when refurbishing our outlets.
Peat stewardship
Peat bogs are one of the UK’s rarest and most vulnerable habitats. Formed over thousands of years, they have very slow growth rates (no more than 1mm per year). In the UK, 94% of their original extent has been lost and less than 6,000 hectares remain in a near-natural condition.
Peat has been used as the major component of most horticultural growing media in the UK for many years and is mainly used as a multi-purpose compost. Sustainable alternatives are available, for which there has been poor uptake to date. The Co-operative Group was the first major retailer to stock peat-free salad cress, which, rather than being sold in peat-lined punnets, is grown on special matting made of 100% biodegradable material. The Co-operative Food sells an own-brand peat-free compost, and is in the process of reducing the amount of peat sold, in order to meet the Government’s target to phase out peat use in the amateur gardener market by 2020. In 2011, the peat in all Co-operative Food branded growing media will be reduced to 20%.
The blanket bog areas on the high moorland plateau of the Peak District contain some of the oldest peat deposits in the UK, which provide a home for breeding birds and rare plants. The loss of sphagnum moss, predominantly due to historic pollution, over grazing and fire damage, has been a major factor in the erosion of blanket peat in the South Pennines. So, in spring 2009 The Co-operative Foundation funded Moors for the Future, to develop a method for large-scale cultivation and spreading of sphagnum. The final results of the project will be published in early 2011, however initial results look very positive.
The Co-operative Financial Services
The Co-operative Bank’s Ethical Policy states that it won’t invest in businesses whose core activity contributes to the unsustainable harvest of natural resources, including timber and fish. The Ethical Engagement Policy of The Co-operative Investments states that it will encourage the businesses in whi
ch it invests to end the exploitation of nature – which results in the loss of plants and animals and their surroundings – and consider more sustainable natural products and services.
The Co-operative Bank offers a range of affinity credit cards. These include the RSPB card, which raised almost £5.6m for Britain’s threatened wetlands between 1999 and 2010.
We report on our ecological performance in our annual Sustainability Report. For more information, visit our ecological sustainability section.