Oxfam has released a comprehensive report that measures how the world's 10 largest food companies perform on food justice issues.
Behind the Brands is part of Oxfam’s GROW campaign to help create a world where everyone has enough to eat. Right now” nearly one in eight people on earth go to bed hungry. The majority of these people are farmers or farm workers supplying the very food system that is failing them.
The 10 companies Oxfam scores are Associated British Foods” Coca-Cola” Danone” General Mills” Kellogg” Mars” Mondelez” Nestlé” PepsiCo and Unilever. Collectively” these companies make $1 billion a day. Oxfam based its report on seven criteria: small-scale farmers” farm workers” water” land” climate change” women’s rights and transparency.
While the food system is complex and its problems multi-faceted” it is known that the world’s largest food and beverage companies have enormous influence. Their policies drive how food is produced” the way resources are used and the extent to which the benefits trickle down to the marginalised millions at the bottom of their supply chains.
The campaign aims to provide people who buy and enjoy these products with the information they need to hold the Big 10 to account for what happens in their supply chains. In putting together a scorecard based entirely on publicly available information on company policies” Oxfam poses the question “what are they doing to clean up their supply chains”?