European Commission, Brussels Monitoring of REAP commitments & technical support for Retail Forum issue papers Final Report 20. December 2013 Consortium ETREAP Expert Team REAP No. ENV/C.1/SER/2011/0019 2 European Commission Final Report Services on Monitoring Retailers’ REAP commitments No. ENV/C.1/SER/2011/0019 3 Content 1 Executive Summary ...................................................................................................................5 2 Major achievements in different areas of activity ................................................................. 11 2.1 Energy Efficiency .......................................................................................................... 11 2.2 Greening the Distribution System ............................................................................... 13 2.3 Marketing & Communication ...................................................................................... 14 2.4 Sustainable Products ................................................................................................... 15 2.5 Carbon Footprint of Stores .......................................................................................... 17 2.6 Packaging Optimisation ............................................................................................... 19 2.7 Waste Management .................................................................................................... 20 2.8 Water Management .................................................................................................... 21 2.9 Sustainable Management ............................................................................................ 22 2.10 Environmental LIFE CYCLE Information for products used every day in households ................................................................................................................... 22 3 Achievements made by retailer and retail association .......................................................... 24 3.1 Achievements made by REAP Member Companies .................................................... 25 3.1.1 ASDA Walmart (UK) ................................................................................................ 25 3.1.2 Auchan .................................................................................................................... 26 3.1.3 C&A (Retail Services Company) .............................................................................. 27 3.1.4 Colruyt (BE) ............................................................................................................. 28 3.1.5 Carrefour (FR) ......................................................................................................... 29 3.1.6 Delhaize Group ....................................................................................................... 30 3.1.7 El Corte Inglés ......................................................................................................... 31 3.1.8 EROSKI .................................................................................................................... 32 3.1.9 IKEA ......................................................................................................................... 33 3.1.10 Inditex ..................................................................................................................... 34 3.1.11 Kaufland (DE) .......................................................................................................... 35 3.1.12 Lidl .......................................................................................................................... 36 3.1.13 Marks & Spencer (UK) ............................................................................................ 37 3.1.14 Mercadona (ES) ...................................................................................................... 38 3.1.15 Metro Group ........................................................................................................... 39 3.1.16 REWE ...................................................................................................................... 40 3.1.17 Royal Ahold ............................................................................................................. 41 3.1.18 Sonae ...................................................................................................................... 42 European Commission Final Report Services on Monitoring Retailers’ REAP commitments No. ENV/C.1/SER/2011/0019 4 3.1.19 TESCO ...................................................................................................................... 43 3.2 Achievements made by Retail Associations ................................................................ 44 3.2.1 APED (PT) ................................................................................................................ 44 3.2.2 Confederación Española de Comercio CEC (ES) ..................................................... 45 3.2.3 Euro Coop ............................................................................................................... 46 4 Verification of achievements by store visits .......................................................................... 53 5 Evaluation of the up-take of issue paper recommendations ................................................ 54 5.1 Energy Efficiency of Stores (September 2009) ............................................................ 54 5.2 Optimisation of Distribution Systems (December 2009) ............................................. 54 5.3 Marketing and Effective Communication (April 2010) ................................................ 54 5.4 Timber (June 2010) ...................................................................................................... 55 5.5 Environmental LIFE CYCLE Information for Products Used Every Day in Households (November 2010) ..................................................................................... 55 5.6 Measurement and reduction of carbon footprint of stores (January 2011) ............... 55 5.7 Labelling (June 2011) ................................................................................................... 56 5.8 Packaging optimisation (November 2011) .................................................................. 56 5.9 Sustainable seafood (June 2012) ................................................................................. 56 5.10 Waste Minimisation (October 2012) ........................................................................... 57 5.11 Sustainability of Textiles (August 2013)....................................................................... 57 5.12 Water Footprint (envisaged December 2013) ............................................................. 57 6 Conclusions and Recommendations ...................................................................................... 59 6.1 General conclusions ..................................................................................................... 59 6.2 Examples of good practice in 2012 .............................................................................. 59 6.3 Conclusions on uptake of issue paper recommendations ........................................... 62 6.4 Recommendations for future REAP progress monitoring ........................................... 64 European Commission Final Report Services on Monitoring Retailers’ REAP commitments No. ENV/C.1/SER/2011/0019 5 1 Executive Summary The Retail Forum1 is a multi-stakeholder platform set up in order to exchange best practices on sustainability in the European retail sector and to identify opportunities and barriers that may foster or hinder the achievement of sustainable consumption and production. Membership in the Retail Forum is voluntary and open to all retailers who join the Retailers' Environmental Action Plan (REAP). Environmental initiatives of REAP Members are reported in the Matrix of Environmental Action Points (MAP) which records progress made in the environmental sector over time. This report contains the external monitoring of the achievements made by members of the Retail Forum by the end of 2012. In addition the report provides a long-term progress overview over the past four progress monitoring reporting years. The REAP database - by October 2013 - contains about 596 reported environmental commitments from major European retail companies and associations. Compared with last year’s database, 61 commitments have been removed, and 141 new commitments have been added. The total figure comprises 194 commitments in the category “What we sell”, 268 commitments in the category “How we sell” and 132 commitments in the category “Communication”. Taking into account the number of targets scheduled for 2011 and before of 196 there remain 400 future oriented commitments. This corresponds to an increase in future oriented commitments compared to the previous reporting period in 2012 of about 80. Almost 60 % of the commitments relevant for this year (221)2 have timelines for 2012 or are classified as ongoing and have been included in the summary assessment for achievements made. In this context it is important to note that the majority of commitments this time are ongoing (153) whilst only 68 have a fixed timeline. 15 % (61) have short-term timelines for 2013 and 2014, and 22% (100) have long-term targets up to 2020/2050 (89) or are not specified. Further refinements of topic areas caused