Supply chains (Scope 3) toward sustainable food systems: An analysis of food & beverage processing corporate greenhouse gas emissions disclosure

Abstract

To align business activities with the Paris Agreement goal to limit global warming to 1.5°, companies may disclose and set targets to mitigate their emissions. The global food system contributes up to 37% of total annual emissions. Major food & beverage processing companies heavily contribute to food system emissions through their supply chains. Despite this, sector-specific analysis of the status and quality of scope 3 emissions for food & beverage processing companies is lacking. Using 2018 CDP data to build a sample of 153 companies, the authors describe the state of voluntary disclosure, particularly for scope 3, for food & beverage processing companies. Further, the paper investigated the effect of emissions performance, national environmental policy, international negotiation group, and primary activity on scope 3 disclosure. It also examined the effect of primary activity, scope 3 disclosure, and national environmental policy and international negotiation group on direct- and energy-related emissions performance. The authors found scope 3 disclosure in the food & beverage processing sector was incomplete and inconsistent. The 2018 Environmental Performance Index score and the international negotiating group of a company's headquarter country were significant predictors of scope 3 disclosure by category. Firm size (by revenue) was the only significant predictor of direct and energy-related (scopes 1 and 2) emissions, but was not correlated with improved emissions performance. The authors concluded with a set of recommendations to improve the availability and transparency of scope 3 emissions data, and invited further research into sector-specific scope 3 disclosure, performance, effect of firm size and climate policy at the national and international levels.