The UK grocery market’s stagnation around environmental action is creating a broken food system that is speeding up environmental collapse and creating supply and price volatility, WWF has warned.
CDP estimates that 90% of food sector emissions happen in the supply chain.
The organisation’s latest report, ‘What’s in Store for the Planet’, examined data from 10 major retailers, including Aldi, Asda, Co-op, Marks & Spencer, Tesco and Waitrose, comprising 90% of the UK’s total grocery market.
The report concludes that currently, not enough is being done to deliver systemic change that could help the sector meet 2030 targets. It finds that without immediate action, environmental impacts will increase, threatening food security and driving up food prices.
The report recognised several significant areas of concern: that 2025 targets on deforestation will be missed, with only 1.8% of soy and 3.1% of cocoa being sourced as deforestation and conversion free (DCF) from high-risk areas; that Scope 3 emissions have not been meaningfully reduced; that retailers are not addressing protein diversification, with unsustainable meat still sold at double the target; and that there has been limited progress in improving livestock production standards.
Recommendations
Progress is being made on Scopes 1 and 2, with retailers around 49% of the way towards meeting their targets in these areas, up 12 percentage points from 2024. Palm oil has also seen a 10% increase in DCF sourcing since 2024.
Given the potential effect of collective action on the sector’s sustainability targets, WWF recommended the food industry immediately table the risk posed by climate change on future commercial viability, embedding sustainability in both short- and long-term business decisions. The organisation cited this as a ‘duty’ to ensure retailers continue being able to stock goods.
The WWF also highlighted their own ‘Blueprint for Action’ as a system retailers could follow to achieve their targets. It argued that while many retailers are taking targeted action, a more dramatic scaling of investment and action was needed from government, industry and the finance sector to ensure the food system remained resilient.
Bread, chocolate, milk, meat and coffee are the products most at risk of price volatility due to drought and heavy rainfall, the report stated.
The way that food is currently produced it is contributing to climate change and devastating our natural world. It is only by protecting the environment that we can maintain the ability to grow healthy and affordable food for everyone. Drought, floods and other severe weather events are already creating food price inflation which every consumer is feeling in their pocket.
So this raises questions about whether supermarkets will, in the years and decades to come, be able to provide the wide range of produce we currently take for granted and at an affordable price.
