This will go down on your permanent record: Food retailers get graded on their pollinator policies
This month, Friends of the Earth published a new scorecard that ranks 25 of the top food retailers in the United States for their policies and practices that support pollinators. It’s a point-based scoring system that assesses different categories of performance and then assigns an overall letter grade. Sadly, the highest grade on the list was a C, and more than two-thirds of the retailers received an F. A less-than-stellar showing for America's grocery stores.
But why do we think these companies will even care about how they scored?
“I think companies are sensitive to their brands and the information that is out there,” says Kendra Klein, senior staff scientist at Friends of the Earth who is overseeing this project. “What we have found is that scorecards can really be a motivator for dialogue with companies and helping them think through what would be a way to make progress.”
This is not Friends’ first retail rodeo. Previously, they helped launch a campaign to get neonicotinoids out of plants labeled “bee friendly” at home and garden stores. More than 140 companies responded by eliminating the pesticides in their supply chains – including major retailers like Home Depot and Lowes.
“We are still in dialogue with some of those largest garden retailers in a nitty-gritty way as they try to sort out how to make those changes in their supply chain,” Klein says.
The effort to move grocery retailers to support bee-friendly practices in their own supply chains began in 2017. And over the past three years, Friends of the Earth have been asking the grocery stores to do three specific things:
1. Phase out pesticides and support growers in shifting to least toxic alternatives.
2. Increase organic offerings. (“Because we know organic is the gold standard for the reduction of toxic pesticides,” Klein says.)
3. Be transparent about their policies and practices.
After completing the scorecard, Friends sent a provisional grade and scoresheet to each company and gave them a few months to respond with updates and corrections. Twelve companies responded and have consistently been in communication with Friends of the Earth about these issues. And six of the companies now have actual policies that address pollinator health and pesticide use.
In most cases, these policies are merely recommendations to the suppliers they work with. Giant Eagle, however, is a notable exception. Its policy specifically says, “If Giant Eagle is not satisfied with the response from those suppliers, Giant Eagle will consider measures up to and including the discontinuance of the supplier’s affected products.” A much tougher stance than any of the other companies.
Interestingly, Giant Eagle only received a D+ on the recent scorecard – which highlights some important nuance in the scoring system. Giant Eagle received the mediocre score because it hasn’t taken any action on the policy yet. But the policy was just released in September, so, presumably, action is on the way. Whole Foods, on the other hand, received a C (which we all know looks way better than a D) but has no written pollinator policy in place; its score comes from excelling at offering organic foods.
So transparency is absolutely essential in all of this. And it might very well be the most powerful aspect of a scorecard.
When companies come up with “bee friendly” policies, there’s always the threat of greenwashing. So having a well-known organization like Friends of the Earth dig into both policies and practices – with a clearly defined methodology and rubric – can be particularly helpful to consumers.
“We are committed to doing our best to understanding what companies are doing,” Klein concluded. “If we know that companies aren’t actually doing anything, then that will be apparent through the scorecard.”
This is the insight we need to make educated spending choices. Because how and where we choose to open our pocketbooks is what retailers do, in fact, care about.
The Bees of Grand Staircase-Escalante are back!
The film will be showing at the Bluff Arts Festival tonight, Friday, Oct. 16. It’s one of many interesting films in the virtual film fest. Registration is free. Join us!
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One More Thing…
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