Marks and Spencer 2008 Annual Report Download - page 33

Fairtrade commodity crops such as sugar
and tea. Additionally we are extending our
Fairtrade ranges of jams.
The Fairtrade premium improves the standard
of living in the local communities funding the
building of schools, healthcare clinics and
transport links.
Health
One of our most significant achievements
for the year is our commitment that all food
produced after 1 April 2008 is now entirely
free of artificial flavours and colouring.
Originally, we planned to only do this with
our children’s food, but having completed
this work by September 2007, we decided
to extend it to all foods. Page 19 details our
greatly increased range of Eat Well healthier
options, as well as our excellent progress in
salt reduction.
Plan A: next steps
We’ve achieved a great deal, and learned
even more during our first full year as a Plan A
business. But we know that there’s a lot to do
if we are to achieve our five-year targets.
Plan A isn’t perfect, and we revisited
our ethical trading commitments to make
them stronger. We will continue to review
our progress and where we need to, change
our commitments to meet emerging issues.
In 2008/09 we will develop better, more
robust systems for gathering the data we
need to evaluate and improve our Plan A
performance. We’ll also be working harder
than ever to develop partnerships that
communicate our messages or help us
to find innovative solutions.
marksandspencer.com/annualreport08 MARKS AND SPENCER GROUP PLC 31
Waste
Right across our business, we’ve been
finding new ways to ensure that by 2012
we send zero waste to landfill from our
own operations. We’ve seen a 6% reduction
in the amount of waste sent to landfill, as
a result of improving the recycling of our
construction waste (see page 24), and
collecting 122 million clothing hangers to
reuse and recycle – over double the amount
collected last year.
In January 2008, we launched the M&S
and Oxfam Clothes Exchange – calling on
customers to dig deep into their wardrobes
to help fight poverty. Customers taking M&S
items to an Oxfam store will help reduce the
1 million tonnes of clothing going to landfill
each year, and in doing so will receive a
£5 (€7) M&S discount voucher to spend
on purchases of £35 (€50) or more.
One of the biggest challenges we face is to
reduce our packaging, but without making
our products susceptible to damage, or in
the case of food, reducing their freshness. In
2007/08 we reduced the weight of packaging
around each Easter egg by nearly 20%. At
the same time, we’ve increased the amount of
our food packaging that is recyclable to 70%.
Sustainable raw materials
During the year we converted all our
toilet rolls, kitchen rolls and tissues to
either Forestry Stewardship Council (FSC)
certified or recycled paper. We also used
FSC materials for more than 50% of our
range of Christmas greeting cards (over
30 million in total) as well as our publications
for customers, including the ‘Your M&S’
magazine. In total 62% of current wood
materials used in M&S products are: FSC
certified, certified by another independent
organisation, or recycled (excluding fabrics).
Fair partner
We use around one third of the world’s
Fairtrade cotton. We are working with local
communities and organisations around the
world, such as the Fairtrade Foundation,
to increase the availability of this and other
Award-winning
work
We were awarded the
World Environment
Center’s (WEC) 24th
Annual Gold Medal for
International Corporate
Achievement in
Sustainable
Development, for
linking sustainability
with our supply chain,
operations and
customers.
We were named joint
leaders in the Marine
Conservation Society’s
supermarket league
table on responsible
fish sourcing.
We won the RSPCA
‘Good Business’ award
for animal welfare in
fashion for the third
consecutive year.
We were named
Compassionate
Supermarket of the
Year for 2007 – not
just because all of our
eggs are free range,
but because we only
sell UK reared veal
which meets high
animal welfare
standards.
Fancy a cuppa?
Already, 100% of the tea and
coffee we sell is Fairtrade;
and we’re pleased to have
recently launched a new
range of single origin
Fairtrade coffees from
Rwanda, as part of
Fairtrade Fortnight.
2
3
4
1
For more detailed information, please visit our
Plan A website at marksandspencer.com/planA
or download our 2007/08 How we do business
report at marksandspencer.com/annualreport08
About us
Key performance indicators Business review Financial review Governance Financial statements
Shareholder information