The British Retail Consortium (BRC) has hit back at suggestions supermarkets are not doing enough to limit their environmental impact, insisting that the UK's largest retailers are already investing heavily in improving their green credentials.
The comments follow a wide ranging report from government advisory body the Sustainable Development Commission, which recommended that the government needed to be "more ambitious" in its attempts to drive improvements in supermarkets' environmental records.
Professor Tim Lang, Commissioner at the Sustainable Development Commission, said that the government needed to work closer with the supermarkets arguing that it "cannot resolve the problems of obesity, waste or climate change" without their co-operation. "There are many areas where the government and retailers are already working together, but government needs to be more ambitious," he said. "With public scrutiny of retailers' behaviour increasing, many supermarkets are keen to work with government to develop a green, healthy and fair food system."
The report calls for the development of a clearer packaging policy; specific emission reduction targets for the food industry; a clear timetable for phasing out the refrigerant greenhouse gases, HCFCs, by 2015; new labelling schemes for products that meet sustainability and water conservation targets; and a more joined up approach to supermarket policy that addresses current areas of contradiction, such as the Department of Health's calls for people to eat more fish running counter to attempts to preserve endangered fish stocks.
It also criticises the supermarkets' climate change and waste policies, asserting that carbon reduction strategies "fail to adequately address transport issues" associated with supply chains and customer journeys, and that waste is being fuelled by multi-buy promotions, over-packaging and use of non-recyclable packaging.
A spokesman for the BRC said that the supermarkets were already working to meet many of the recommendations made by the report. "In essence the Sustainable Development Commission is calling for more collaboration with government to allow supermarkets to use their influence to good effect," he said. " Supermarkets are already doing that both with government and through their own environmental initiatives."
However, he insisted that the reports suggestion that multi-buy promotions increased waste levels and that supermarkets were not doing enough to tackle transport emissions were wide of the mark. "Supermarkets are always looking to make their transport networks more efficient by moving goods in larger quantities and optimising their deliver schedules, because it reduces costs," he said, adding that the accusation that supermarkets contributed to transport emissions by opting for out-of-town locations was also erroneous. "The idea of out-of-town sites has always been a misnomer, retailers always locate close to where people live, which means these sites are actually in the suburbs."
In related news, David Cameron today addressed the centenary conference of the National Farmers Union (NFU), outlining plans for an expansion of US style neighbourhood food co-operatives which could provide a greener alternative to supermarkets.
He called on farmers to "reconnect with customers" by embracing organic box delivery schemes, farmers' markets and local shops, which he claimed could compete with the supermarkets on price by cutting out middle men and transport costs.
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