Future Proofing the Planet with Potatoes!

Lamb Weston has been at the forefront of embracing sustainability for some time and their latest sustainability report shows the forward-thinking giant’s recent initiatives are rising to the challenge, helping operators to please consumers.

Over five years ago, Lamb Weston/ Meijer added ‘sustainable agriculture’ to its six focus areas for sustainability, which also include water, greenhouse gas emissions, plant protection products and biodiversity.

Growing closer

Closer collaboration with growers is key to Lamb Weston’s Sustainable Agriculture Plan. This focuses on healthy soils as the most valuable and scarce natural resource growers use. Lamb Weston is committed to developing their long term relationships with quality farmers in the UK, with approximately 30 carefully selected partners.

And Lamb Weston’s Sustainable Agriculture Plan for 600 growers in Europe includes a 24% drop in energy used and 30% drop in CO2 emissions generated per kg of product. The carbon footprint of their products has been reduced by 21.7% since 2008.

Healthier product development

In the next two years, Lamb Weston aims to focus on a number of key areas that will contribute to more balanced diets by making an impact across their portfolio. For example, they will continue to invest in and develop products that can be cooked without needing to be fried, such as in ovens or air fryers. They will also focus on making products as healthy as possible, by researching ways to lower the oil content of deep-fried products. Their new Innovation Centre will help accelerate these developments.

Gold level progress

One of the main KPIs of Lamb Weston’s Sustainability plan is the Farm Sustainability Assessment (FSA) from the Sustainable Agriculture Initiative (SAI) Platform. The FSA scores growers’ performance on sustainable agriculture on four levels: Gold, Silver, Bronze, and ‘below Bronze’. Their goal for the Farm

Sustainability Assessment is to reach 100% at Gold level and over the last two years they have been making progress, with total grower numbers reaching 80% Silver and 20% Gold. When the Dutch VVAK certification is benchmarked Gold (expected by 2023) they expect to make a significant step towards achieving their 2030 target.

Other spuddy highlights! By Peter Evans, UK & IRL Marketing Manager

With 6.5 million fewer kilometres travelled per year, Lamb Weston has reduced emissions from transporting goods by 5,800 million metre tonnes since 2008 –that’s the same as the amount 1,462 coal fired power plants would emit in one year!

Lamb Weston has sent zero waste to landfill since 2008; they incinerate less than 0.5% of their waste, using every single bit of their potatoes. And to minimise waste, they optimise their plants and potatoes – so they use 99% of the potato, a 12.5% increase compared to 2008. They also develop new potato species that are able to withstand drought.

Now, 99.9% of Lamb Weston’s products and waste streams are reused, recycled or recovered, while products are packed in 100% recyclable plastic and cartons made from 100% recycled, FSC certified cardboard. Lamb Weston uses an advanced system that purifies their process water, turning it back into drinking quality water, which is then reused in their production processes.

Lamb Weston features Skin-On in their fries’ ranges, which means a lower carbon footprint, around 8% more sustainable than Skin-Off chips and the Company is suggesting operators call this out on menu as it would be well-received by consumers, especially if operators state they’ve made a switch from skin-off to skin-on because it’s a more sustainable choice - 1 in 4 consumers choose restaurants or pubs that have strong sustainability credentials! And Skin-On sell for more too!

For innovative ideas, recipes and potato inspiration, head over to www. lambweston.eu/uk, call 0800 963962 or email us at salesUK@lambweston.eu