>>the case for collaboration - Helen Lo, head of CSr and sustainability, Unilever UK
It’s a month since all those resolutions to go to the gym more often, to drink sensibly, to reduce the credit card bills - and, of course, to lose weight - were made. Few of those good intentions will have lasted even this long.
What we learned conclusively in 2003, however, was that diet and health are no longer an issue for individuals, but one for corporate social responsibility (CSR). And if 2003 was the year that public expectations changed on how companies should behave, then 2004 will be the year in which the CSR credentials of the food industry will come under even heavier scrutiny. The question is, do we match up?
I wonder whether the importance and nature of CSR in the present debate are really understood by many in our industry. I am even less sure that there is support for the tough choices, the accountability and internal change good CSR involves.
CSR should weave an understanding of public expectations into the DNA of your company - its product development programmes, risk management, marketing, advertising and its business strategy.
And that’s not all. We accept that the food industry is one of the most competitive in the UK and individual businesses are judged continuously by their shareholders and a whole host of other commentators on being the biggest and the best, the most efficient and the most innovative. It is through this competitiveness that we are one of the most successful industries in consistently delivering the huge range and choice of high-quality, value-for-money products that consumers have come to expect.
However, when it comes to CSR, the public and other stakeholders not only judge us by our brands and companies, but collectively as an industry. Is it right, then, to continue to work in isolation and strive for competitive edge on issues that cannot be effectively managed in this way?
Take Unilever’s interest in sustainable fisheries. We will not hit our target of sourcing all our fish from sustainable sources by 2005, although we have gone a long way towards it. There are many reasons why, but most importantly there is little consumer demand for sustainably sourced fish. It will be a challenge for all of us in the fish supply chain, with the help of governments and multinational institutions, to improve consumer knowledge of the importance of this issue and to provide the
opportunity to buy responsibly sourced products. We can’t do it on our own, but we could if we worked together.
Another example is the debate surrounding health and nutrition. Salt, sugar, fat, advertising to children, health claims, portion sizes - the list goes on. Yet here again we continue to toil away in our respective companies far more than we work together. By doing so, we risk allowing the media and NGOs to claim to be the consumer’s voice - a consumer about whom we know a good deal more than they do.
Worse still, the trust in our brands and the reputation of our businesses may be eroded to the point that genuine initiatives are met with cynicism or simply ignored.
Good CSR can be part of the answer. It means predicting the future needs of consumers and expectations of society as a whole. It’s about making tough business decisions to address those needs and seeing them through. It is also about being big enough to accept that your company is not able to manage all societal issues, such as nutrition and sustainability, by itself and that you may need to call on your industry partners for help.
My resolution for 2004 is to challenge myself and others in our industry to define what we mean by CSR and how committed we are to making it an integral part of our company and industry strategies.
As the politician said, we must all hang together or we shall assuredly hang separately.
It’s a month since all those resolutions to go to the gym more often, to drink sensibly, to reduce the credit card bills - and, of course, to lose weight - were made. Few of those good intentions will have lasted even this long.
What we learned conclusively in 2003, however, was that diet and health are no longer an issue for individuals, but one for corporate social responsibility (CSR). And if 2003 was the year that public expectations changed on how companies should behave, then 2004 will be the year in which the CSR credentials of the food industry will come under even heavier scrutiny. The question is, do we match up?
I wonder whether the importance and nature of CSR in the present debate are really understood by many in our industry. I am even less sure that there is support for the tough choices, the accountability and internal change good CSR involves.
CSR should weave an understanding of public expectations into the DNA of your company - its product development programmes, risk management, marketing, advertising and its business strategy.
And that’s not all. We accept that the food industry is one of the most competitive in the UK and individual businesses are judged continuously by their shareholders and a whole host of other commentators on being the biggest and the best, the most efficient and the most innovative. It is through this competitiveness that we are one of the most successful industries in consistently delivering the huge range and choice of high-quality, value-for-money products that consumers have come to expect.
However, when it comes to CSR, the public and other stakeholders not only judge us by our brands and companies, but collectively as an industry. Is it right, then, to continue to work in isolation and strive for competitive edge on issues that cannot be effectively managed in this way?
Take Unilever’s interest in sustainable fisheries. We will not hit our target of sourcing all our fish from sustainable sources by 2005, although we have gone a long way towards it. There are many reasons why, but most importantly there is little consumer demand for sustainably sourced fish. It will be a challenge for all of us in the fish supply chain, with the help of governments and multinational institutions, to improve consumer knowledge of the importance of this issue and to provide the
opportunity to buy responsibly sourced products. We can’t do it on our own, but we could if we worked together.
Another example is the debate surrounding health and nutrition. Salt, sugar, fat, advertising to children, health claims, portion sizes - the list goes on. Yet here again we continue to toil away in our respective companies far more than we work together. By doing so, we risk allowing the media and NGOs to claim to be the consumer’s voice - a consumer about whom we know a good deal more than they do.
Worse still, the trust in our brands and the reputation of our businesses may be eroded to the point that genuine initiatives are met with cynicism or simply ignored.
Good CSR can be part of the answer. It means predicting the future needs of consumers and expectations of society as a whole. It’s about making tough business decisions to address those needs and seeing them through. It is also about being big enough to accept that your company is not able to manage all societal issues, such as nutrition and sustainability, by itself and that you may need to call on your industry partners for help.
My resolution for 2004 is to challenge myself and others in our industry to define what we mean by CSR and how committed we are to making it an integral part of our company and industry strategies.
As the politician said, we must all hang together or we shall assuredly hang separately.
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