Sustainability update 2016 People, plants and planet Being the change we want to see in the world
1
At Pukka we create delicious organic herbal teas and incredible health supplements that take people on a journey to a healthier, happier life. ‘Pukka’ means authentic in Hindi, and it’s at the heart of everything we do. We only use the finest grade organic herbs sustainably sourced and fairly traded. We strive every day to help create a Pukka Planet benefiting people, plants and planet. Our sustainability vision supports this mission: “Pukka is universally recognised as a pioneer in supporting healthy living of individuals, society and the environment. We have a demonstrable net positive impact on people, plants and planet.” Net positive is a way of doing business which puts back more into society, the environment and the global economy than it takes out.
386 million colourful cups of organic tea this year
Our products are never tested on animals
£89,000
invested into community fair premium funds benefiting our producers and community life
39
2
Sustainability at Pukka
11,500,000 doses of organic herbal wellbeing through our supplements
0
Zero waste to landfill, helping to keep our operational footprint light
certified carbon neutral in our operations
£400,000 donated to environmental charities
100% certified organic herbs, protecting people, plants and planet
100%
biodegradable teabags, staple-free for animal-friendly compost
27
Fair for Life FairWild teas certified teas
690 students enrolled onto our online course, ‘Discover the way of Herbs’
Renewable electricity from British sunshine, wind and rain
3
The year in brief…
A giant fair leap – all our teas achieved Fair for Life certification in 2016 Fair For Life certification is much more than a logo on a pack. It’s the result of a huge amount of effort from many partners and represents many inspiring stories of social change. 40% of the herbs we buy are now fair certified, in addition to their organic certification. Find our more on page 18.
Being the change – Pukka becomes a certified B Company This year we became a certified B Company, giving us a powerful platform, alongside over 1,800 other ethical and environmentally focussed businesses globally, to work together to accelerate the change we need to see in the world. Find out more on page 42.
Events that tread lightly Our event displays are created from sustainably sourced materials. Wherever possible we re-use materials for as long as we can. Find out more on page 30.
100% organic through and through – right down to the string in our teabags Our commitment to organic cultivation is a central part of Pukka’s DNA. We even use certified organic cotton string on our teabags. Find out more on page 17.
The search for a recyclable tea envelope Finding the right material for our envelopes that will keep the tea fresh and is recyclable was a key technical challenge for several years. We are getting closer to a solution Find out more on page 21
4
1 year of 1% for the Planet – £400,000 donated to environmental charities
Carbon neutral for the 2nd year running
In 2015 we joined 1% for the Planet, a global movement of companies donating at least 1% of their turnover to environmental organisations worldwide annually. Find our more on page 43.
This year, our UK sourcing partners and co-packers also signed up with renewable energy suppler Good Energy, creating a unique supply chain powered by sunshine, wind and rain. Find out more on page 24.
5
The year ahead Our targets & challenges for next year Developing our ‘net positive’ strategy expect a focus on wellbeing, new sustainable health paradigms and sustainable sourcing Setting science-based carbon reduction targets as part of our long-term commitment to be carbon neutral from crop to cup by 2030 ‘B the change’ by making Pukka a ‘Do Nation’ getting carbon savvy and saving 500,000 cups of tea worth of carbon as a Pukka team through pledges to make small, sustainable changes to our daily lives with www.WeAreDoNation.com You can see Pukka people making their pledges at our Company Day in our cover image.
6
Contents A message from Sebastian and Tim
6
Introduction
8
Product excellence
10
Climate change
15
Resource conservation
21
Sustainable communities
22
Ethical practices
28
Progress towards a Pukka Planet
33
Appendix 1 Social Mission
34
7
A message from Sebastian and Tim
It’s been one hell of a year. So much has changed. So much has become more vulnerable. We lost our political union with Europe, lost liberal America, and I know many of us have lost a little faith in humanity’s ability to live peacefully together. We have all had to dig deep.
Despite such unrest comes hope. The hard miles put in by the environmental movement are paying dividends. In some areas more than 50% of UK energy is now from low-carbon and renewable sources. Tiger populations are on the increase, FairWild sustainable harvesting of herbs is growing in popularity, there is more land certified organic than ever before and the world aligned this year to meet the challenge of climate change by agreeing at COP 21 to minimalise temperature increase. In amongst managing the privilege of our 25% growth in 2016 we also became a certified B Company, the global business community for creating positive social and environmental impact. B Company certification cements Pukka’s dedication to servicing society and the planet in everything we do by requiring a legal change to our Articles of Assocation to serve all stakeholders in our business decision making. It means we join an ever-growing community of businesses demanding commercial and political commitment to creating greater social equality and environmental benefit. Of course, Pukka’s essence has always been to serve people and the planet; all of our teas and herbal solutions are certified organic – even down to the string on our teabags. And in 2016 we met our promise for all of our teas being certified Fair for Life. We love Fair for Life as a fair trade certification as it audits the whole supply chain; from farmer, to our blending partners, to our tea packing right back to us all at Pukka HQ, ensuring every part of the Pukka-chain cares for everyone involved fairly. We also met our commitment to empowering environmental protection by exceeding our 1% For The Planet targets. This is not a donation from profits but a
8
contribution off the top line ensuring that as we grow we are able to fund more environmental engagement. We are extremely happy to have contributed over £400,000 to 1% For The Planet causes this last year. This all backs up our fundamental purpose of helping connect people with plants and ensuring a more sustainable approach to healthcare is available for our society. With antibiotic resistance, diabetes and mental health disorders creating huge pressure on individual lives as well as public health systems, it’s time for us to take natural health seriously as attested to by its safety1, sustainability2 and efficacy3 . We continue in our efforts to drive greater natural healthcare through our range of organic supplements that are seeing positive growth every year. We further this commitment to natural healthcare by ensuring that 20% of our team are qualified herbalists, nutritionists, plant scientists and sustainable agriculture specialists. The benefits of organic farming are finding solid scientific backing too with organic plants showing significantly higher levels of protective antioxidant compounds4. Indeed, there are some encouraging signs that we are making progress but the change needs
to be quicker. The natural health and organic sectors continue to see significant growth around the world; the US organic sector is predicted to grow over 18% in the five years between 2013-185. The herbal sector grew at 6.8% in 2014 too6. We have a lot to do in the UK with total organic food consumption sitting at a measly 1.4% compared to Denmark’s 8% and America’s 4.3%7. The failure of current environmental and health policies puts the responsibility on us as individuals, communities and businesses to lead this change. And all of our combined hard work is making a fundamental and long-lasting difference. Thanks to the hard graft of our farmers, partners and staff, as well as our Pukka community of herb lovers, Pukka is now reaching and helping millions of people a year. Some even think we are touching the hearts of millions each day and helping them to live a more thoughtful, considered and connected life. So there is hope and you are at the heart of it. Every cup of Pukka tea and every one of our herbal remedies creates a little taste of organic hope. Thank you for helping us believe.
1 http://anhinternational.org/2012/07/11/anh-exclusive-natural-health-products-ultrasafe-and-drugs-as-dangerous-as-war/ 2 http://anhinternational.org/wp-content/uploads/old/files/100617-SustainableHealthcare_White-Paper.pdf 3 http://ehtpa.eu/pdf/Scoping%20the%20Evidence%20Base%20for%20Herbal%20Medicines%20FINAL%20.pdf 4
Higher antioxidant and lower cadmium concentrations and lower incidence of pesticide residues in organically grown crops: a systematic literature review and meta-analyses, Baranski et al, Leifert Br J Nut 0514
5 http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/Markets/US-organic-food-market-to-grow-14from-2013-18 6 http://cms.herbalgram.org/press/2015/HerbalDietarySupplementSalesinUSRisein2014. html 7
Soil Association Market Report 2015: see http://www.soilassociation.org/news/newsstory/articleid/7805/organic-market-shows-improved-growth-amidst-tumbling-foodprices
9
Introduction Welcome to our third sustainability report, it reviews our social, environmental and ethical performance for our reporting period, which aligns with our financial year 1 September 2015 to 31 August 2016. It covers the financial control boundary (which is also our operational boundary as Pukka owns 100% of its operations) of Pukka Herbs Ltd which includes Pukka Inc. in the US, in line with International Financial Reporting Standards and the Climate Change Reporting framework. Our sustainability policy8 sets out the principles that guide our decision-making in respect to our social, environmental and ethical performance. From this we developed a sustainability programme which has five key themes through which we aim to make the biggest difference possible: product excellence, climate change, resource conservation, sustainable communities and ethical practices. Like last year’s report, the following chapters highlight our approach, our progress and discuss our challenges over the last year. Some challenges remain the same as last year, and in other areas we have made significant progress or new challenges have emerged. During the next financial year we will be developing a ‘net positive’ strategy with sustainability non-profit organisation Forum for the Future. This will help us set stretching sustainability goals and commitments which will shape our sustainability programme and reporting for future years. In spring 2016 we began to prepare for this work with a workshop to identify our most material issues (ie the risks and opportunities across our value chain that will have the most significant impact on our business as well as people and planet). We looked at some of the big picture challenges, such as climate change impacts on our supply chain, global inequality and demographic change. This helped us to identify the following themes:
• Security of supply: building resilience to impacts on herb quality, land availability, yield • • • • •
pressures from challenges such as soil erosion, climate change, biodiversity loss, population growth and urbanisation Soil Carbon: the potential for our organic agricultural supply chain to maximise biological diversity, produce the highest quality herbs and capture more carbon in the soil Energy efficiency: in operations, transport, and the potential for technology to help us be more efficient Wellbeing: the power and potential of herbs to create a paradigm shift in preventative healthcare Waste: investing in renewable sourced closed loop packaging. We have a major commitment to solving the riddle of the recyclable envelope for our teas People: investing in a nature inspired leadership programme at the Eden project for all of our Pukka people.
The information contained in this report is publically available with the aim that we can all work together to create a world where people, plants and the planet thrive together. We also report throughout the year on Responsible 1009 an external body that identifies and supports transparency in business by requiring companies to report on key responsibility issues which are then open to public scrutiny. You are welcome to keep up to date and to comment on our performance on the Responsible 100 website, or if you have any specific questions about this report, please contact our Sustainability Manager sustainability@pukkaherbs.com.
8
10
View online at www.pukkaherbs.com or in our FY15 Sustainability Report
9 http://responsible100.com/
11
Our Wisdom Seed Values At Pukka, we believe it is vital to the success and enjoyment of our journey together that we all connect with a common culture. We need to regularly remind ourselves of the wisdom values that spurred our creation so we can serve people, plants and planet to the best of our ability. To give life to these values and remain connected with the Ayurvedic wisdom tradition from which Pukka was born we have created these four Wisdom Seeds; Truth (with its twin components of authenticity and discernment); Respect (with its twin components of self-awareness and compassion); Purity (with the components, open-heartedness and clear-headedness) and Effort (comprising purposeful and inspiring). We use these Wisdom Seeds everyday when we meet, in recruitment and selection, in our performance reviews, in our business metrics and in our personal development programmes. And we do the best that we can to use them as a daily point of reflection to inspire and guide us in our thinking and behaviour. An organisation’s values are too important to be left to chance and too critical to be expressed in bland terms. We find that it is the creative nature of the Wisdom Seeds that makes them at once profound and practical.
Puk.ka / puk’ / e
Adjective: excellent, proper or genuine ORIGIN from Hindi pakkā: authentic, real, delicious.
12
13
Acheiving our mission Pukka Herbs Ltd is a privately owned limited company operating in the United Kingdom. Our Founders Tim and Sebastian set up business in 2002 from Tim’s spare bedroom and Sebastian’s kitchen. Our herbal teas and wellbeing supplements are now sold in over 40 countries in Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia and North America. On the 31 August 2016, we had 92 team members based at our registered office at 8 Hawkfield Business Park, Bristol, and other temporary office space in South Bristol, as well as our warehouse in North Bristol. Our executive board is responsible for the governance of our sustainability programme supported by the strategic sustainability group which includes one of our Founders, our Operations and Sales Directors, our Head of Communications, our Sustainable Herbs Manager, and our Sustainability Manager. Everyone at Pukka contributes to its delivery and we support this by training at whole business events and briefings and through our induction programme for new team members. We monitor our performance using key performance indicators following, where appropriate, Defra Environmental Reporting Guidelines June 201310. This report also contains Standard Disclosures from the Global Reporting initiative (GRI) Sustainability Reporting Guidelines (G4).
10 https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/environmental-reporting-guidelines-including-mandatory-greenhouse-gas-emissions-reporting-guidance
14
15
Product excellence Our herbal teas and health supplements are not just good for you, they’re also good for people and the planet. At Pukka, we design our products to deliver excellence in terms of environmental and social benefits as well as in quality by using medicinal grade herbs. How do we do this? •
• •
• •
All of our products are certified organic by the Soil Association to UK/EU standards and compliant with the US National Organic Programme. Our commitment to organic cultivation is a central part of Pukka’s DNA. We even use certified organic cotton string on our teabags. For more information: [link to http://www.pukkaherbs.com/pukka-planet/stories/plants/organiccotton/] We ensure that World Health Organisation guidelines on good agricultural and collection practice are followed through supplier audits and rigorous quality control procedures. All of our herbs are fully traceable back to the source. Our herbs are traded fairly and we use Fair for Life11, Fairtrade12 and FairWild13 certifications where appropriate. Most people are familiar with Fairtrade certification which ensures better prices, decent working conditions and fair terms of trade for farmers and workers. FairWild is a pioneering standard to ensure sustainable collection of wild sourced ingredients, and fair pay for collectors. Fair for Life is one of the fairest, most equitable and transparent fair and ethical trade system in the world. We never test on animals in accordance with our animal testing policy as certified by Cruelty Free International. Everything we make is suitable for vegetarians14. We use Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)15 certified, recyclable materials and vegetable inks for our tea and wellbeing cartons. We use only synthetic (rather than animal) glues.
Achievements 2016 1
2
Achieving our target to be 100% certified Fair for Life across our tea range
Developing Pukka’s Social Mission
11 http://www.fairforlife.org/pmws/indexDOM.php?client_id=fairforlife&page_id=home 12 http://www.fairtrade.org.uk/ 13 http://www.fairwild.org/ 14 Our range is not 100% vegan. Products such as Ghee are produced from cows milk, Golden Preserve contains ghee and honey, our Vitalise contains Bee Pollen and a selection of Pukka teas also contain honey (Lemon, Ginger and Manuka Honey and Chamomile, Vanilla and Manuka Honey). Elderberry Syrup also contains honey. 15 http://www.fsc-uk.org/en-uk
16
17
1
Achieving our target for all our teas to be Fair for Life certified
2
Developing Pukka’s Social Mission In 2016, we developed a new social policy, as part of our Fair for Life certification. Pukka’s social mission came about from months of consultation with Pukka team members and is inspired by the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and the Hindi Proverb “Help your brother’s boat across and your own will reach the shore”. You can see it in the appendix of this report.
Pukka insight: Meet the family of Pukka growers Click here to view the film online
Fair For Life certification is much more than a logo on a pack. It is the result of a huge amount of effort from many partners, and represents many inspiring stories of social change. To achieve our goal of 100% Fair for Life certification, at least 20% of every tea blend needs to be fair certified. We achieved this minimum requirement across all of our teas, and in many cases exceeded it. In fact, over 40% of the herbs we bought in 2016 were certified fair. All of us, from the farmers to our staff at Pukka, have had to make a few changes to the way we work. For example, some of the farmers have had to increase the amount that they pay labourers, or start keeping better records of working hours, or to invest in improved machinery to reduce the risk of injury or poor health. If the farmer needs support in doing this, it is the shared responsibility of the whole supply chain to increase prices to make it possible. Unlike many fair trade programmes, Fair For Life certification does not just focus on the farmers – it includes every link in the suppy chain. In our case this includes in-country partners who consolidate and process the herbs as well as co-packers in the UK and Germany who help us source and blend the herbs, and of course all of us at the Pukka HQ in Bristol. Everyone in a Fair for Life certified supply chain now has access to benefits such as health insurance, maternity cover and very clear working hours, with overtime payment where required. The result of this is an increasingly healthy and empowered community of people involved in the production of Pukka teas and supplements – good news for everyone!
18
We’re passionate about creating teas and supplements with the very best organic herbs possible - whether in our delicious teas or efficacious supplements. This means growing only herbs of exemplary quality that a professional herbalist would be happy to dispense. For us, it means working with growers and producers who share our vision and values.
The search for incredible people Our search for the very best growers has led us all over the world: across Europe, Africa, India, South-East Asia and Central America. In these beautiful places we have found herb farmers with a profound respect for and understanding of nature, the soil, and plants. Today, we’re blessed to be working with thousands of Pukka growers in over 20 different countries around the world. These farmers’ unrelenting hard work and enthusiasm, often in the face of tough living conditions, combined with their knowledge of plants and farming, still inspires us today. We are fortunate to be working with them, creating mutually-beneficial, long-lasting relationships.
Nurturing our Pukka growers In 2006, we created a training programme based on the World Health Organisation’s ‘Good Agriculture and Collection Practices for Medicinal Plants’ (or GACP for short). The programme helps farmers qualify as Pukka growers by giving them guidance on how to best grow, harvest, and dry herbs to optimise their yield, quality and efficacy. It also supports farmers in growing and collecting their plants in a sustainable way - thus conserving and protecting vulnerable species. It’s something we’re very proud of at Pukka.
19
Key performance indicators This year we celebrate our teas becoming 100% certified Fair for Life. Graph 1 shows the volume of herbs for our
800 700
We purchased 883 tonnes of herbs in FY16, 82% of which were cultivated. 77% of our wild collected herbs were FairWild certified (up from 70% in FY15).
Graph 2 Breakdown of Fair Volumes in FY16
Total Fair certified herbs purchased for our teas (t)
(tonnes)
(tonnes)
teas which are Fair for Life, FairWild or Fairtrade certified. To be certified Fair for Life, a tea must contain at least 20% fair sourced herbs.
Total herbs purchased for our teas (t)
600
150 120
500 400
90
300
60
200
30
100 0
2013
2014
2015
0
2016
FairWild
Fairtrade
Fair For Life
Table 1 shows the evolution of our fair certified teas. Product contribution
Percentage of range 2014
Percentage of range 2015
Percentage of range 2016
Fair certified teas
59% (20/34)
62% (23/37)
100% (39/39)
38.5tonne63.56
Priorities for 2017 •
•
•
20
Further increasing the volume of our ingredients that are fair certified to cover new tea launches and an increasing number of our supplements. Our target is to reach 56% fair certification by volume of herbs during 2017. As we increase our certification, we have another exciting year ahead working to create significant positive effects on the lives of thousands of farmers as well as their families. We often get asked why our tea bags are individually packaged. We do it to ensure the best quality and healthiest herbs in every cup. We go to great lengths to source high specification, organic, medicinal grade herbs. The envelope best protects the herbs from heat, light and moisture - which would diminish their depth of flavour and health benefits - as they prevent the high levels of essential oils from evaporating. As reported in our last sustainability report, finding the right material for our envelopes that will keep the tea fresh and is recyclable remains a key challenge this year. This is a technical challenge for our suppliers and we are getting closer to a solution as we continue to trial alternatives, speak with our suppliers and horizon scan for new plant-based solutions. We are always open to new ideas and innovations so please get in contact if you think you can help
21
Climate change
Fig 1
It’s no exaggeration to say that this is a crucial time for this beautiful planet we are lucky enough to call home. Scientists predict that if we do not cut carbon emissions now, it will have catastrophic effects for us all in the future16. Our business is designed to succeed in a low-carbon and climate-resilient economy due to the organic farming methods used by our growers. Many people are well versed in the benefits of organic farming; no system of farming has lower pesticide use, it is more natural, better for our health and the health of farmers, better for wildlife, biodiversity and animal welfare. But you may not know that organic farming is also far more climate-friendly than conventional farming. Organic farming methods help take carbon dioxide from the air and lock it in the soil – a process called carbon sequestration. The Soil Association has calculated that if all if all UK farmland was converted to organic farming, at least 3.2 million tonnes of carbon would be taken up by the soil each year - the equivalent of taking nearly 1 million cars off the road17. That said, we cannot make healing herbs on a sick planet. Even organic farmers will face significant challenges as weather gets more extreme; drought, floods, increasing pests and disease will all impact agriculture and farmers. Building climate resilience into our supply chain is, therefore a key priority for us. In our business operations we follow the ‘reduce, replace, offset’ mantra: 1. Reduce energy use by avoiding using energy in the first place or by becoming more energy efficient. 2. Replace fossil fuels with renewable options. And 3. Offset any remaining carbon emissions. We reduce our energy and fuel use at Pukka. Our biggest operational carbon footprint is from logistics and freight, followed by commuting. We transport by sea or land, except when we need to respond urgently to exceptional circumstances. In 2017 we will tackle setting science based carbon reduction targets. These will set our trajectory for carbon reduction in line with what climate scientists say is necessary to avoid dangerous climate change. As we prepare to do this, we launched a Do Nation challenge to save 500,000 cups of tea worth of carbon over the year through staff pledges to make small, sustainable changes to their daily lives. This will get us all used to thinking about carbon in our daily decisions and work and home, and an idea of which activities save most carbon. Read more here: https://blog.wearedonation.com/2016/12/12/guest-blog-pukka-herbs-show-how-business-can-be-thechange/ For many years now we have replaced fossil fuels with renewables. The electricity and gas for Pukka offices (where we have control of energy supply) and warehouses is supplied by Good Energy which ensures 100% renewable electricity from British sunshine, wind and rain.
Achievements 2016 1
2
Achieving carbon neutral status for the second year running
My forest: conserving forests in The Western Ghats of India
16 For further information, see http://www.unep.org/newscentre/Default.aspx?DocumentID=2812&ArticleID=11082&l=en 17 http://www.soilassociation.org/innovativefarming/policyresearch/soilcarbon
22
23
2
1 Achieving carbon neutral status for the second year running In 2016 we celebrated being certified carbon neutral in our operations for the second year running. We offset 508 tonnes of carbon dioxide-equivalent18 through an inspiring Gold Standard cookstove project in India called the The Breathing Space Improved Cooking Stoves Programme19. As per the World Health Organization Comparative Risk Study, approximately 400,000 women and children die every year in India due to exposure to smoke from household use of solid fuels. The Breathing Space Programme contributes towards solving the problem of indoor air pollution and reduces GHG emissions by replacing traditional inefficient stoves with cleaner and greener ICS. Offsetting has had a bad reputation in the past, but that is no longer deserved. Using the reduce, replace, offset mantra means you are offsetting within a framework of improving efficiency and reducing carbon use as much as possible, so that offsetting becomes the last step, not the first. And using certified Gold Standard offsets ensure they are top quality and have fantastic social benefits. The Indian project has created job opportunities across the whole value chain including stove technicians, distributors/ dealers, people engaged in awareness campaigns, and other support staff in India).
18 Carbon dioxide equivalent expresses the impact of each different greenhouse gas in terms of the amount of CO2 that would create the same amount of warming 19 http://www.carbonfootprint.com/gs_india_cookstoves.html
24
2 My Forest: conserving forests in The Western Ghats of India My Forest is a project run by the Applied Environmental Research Foundation (AERF) that aims to protect biodiversity in the North Western Ghats – one of the world’s ‘biodiversity hotspots’. Unlike most of the forests in India, which are owned by the government, the majority of forested land in the North Western Ghats is privately owned, which makes it much harder to implement conservation projects as – legally speaking – the owners are free to do what they want with the trees on their land. For many landowners the forests provide an important source of income; when they are in need of cash their easiest option is to sell large trees to logging contractors or to harvest fuel wood to sell to local industries. As a result, the region is experiencing an exceptionally high rate of deforestation. In the absence of government protection, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) play a vital role in working with local people to protect the Forests. AERF have been developing a variety of conservation strategies in the Western Ghats for many years now. Pukka Herbs is involved in two of these initiatives: Conservation Agreements with the local community and FairWild certification of medicinal herbs. Both approaches are designed to address the economic pressures that drive landowners to cut down valuable trees. Conservation Agreements are essentially a short-term but effective solution, through which landowners are paid a sum of money in return for protecting and/or regenerating areas of forest, normally for five to 10 years at a time. These agreements buy time for developing longer-term strategies such as FairWild certification, which provides the villagers with financial incentives to protect the trees by ensuring they are paid a premium price for sustainably harvested wild plants and a community fund for social and environmental development. In our third year supporting this five-year project, AERF have continued to use our donation to pay the salaries of community conservation stewards who are working with private forest owners to protect against deforestation. They have also continued distributing energy efficient cook stoves and biomass briquettes for the local community to use instead of chopping down wood from the forest. 25
Key performance indicators
Priorities for 2016 • Now that we are carbon neutral ourselves, we feel OK about asking others to act too. In light of global climate talks and the urgency of addressing climate change we have brought our target forward to be carbon neutral from crop to cup by 2030 (instead of 2045). We believe (based on lifecycle assessments completed on conventional tea) that the carbon footprint of our teas is heaviest at the consumer use phase (ie boiling kettles to make tea), followed by the agricultural phase; none of which are in our direct control. As we grow, we should have more influence over the choices our suppliers make as well as the resources to encourage energy efficiency and the switch to renewable energy by our consumers. We will continue to plan reaching our ambitious target over the next year. It’s a massive undertaking that we can’t achieve alone – so we are exploring many partnership opportunities, that cover both supply chain resilience and carbon reduction, as well as encouraging people to boil less water. If you think you can help us, please get in touch.
Our carbon data covers all scope 1 and scope 2 emissions as well as available data for scope 3 emissions for sources recommended for reporting under the Carbon Neutral Protocol for carbon neutral company status. The scope 3 data not currently available includes outbound courier delivery of packages, third party road transportation and storage of production-related goods and sold products (excluding raw materials freight) (which would require significant data collection effort) and taxis and hotels for business travel (which we believe will be immaterial). We estimate that this would account for about 25% of our total gross emissions. Table 2 shows our total carbon footprint for FY16, FY15 and FY14 Co2(t)
Carbon Intensity (tCo2e/£M turnover)
FY16
558
19.95
FY15
479
21.41
FY14
465
27.2
FY16 Type 3 Breakdown
FY16 Scope Breakdown
• We know that for our business to thrive, a stable climate to grow our herbs is essential, and so climate change poses a significant risk. The continued increase in numbers and severity of unpredictable weather events as a result of climate change will mean ever more difficult growing conditions for farmers. We will continue to focus on looking for ways to build resilience to climate change in our supply chain as well as mapping our supply chain to include climate and environmental risk into our risk management processes
FY15 Type 3 Breakdown
1% Total scope 1 Gas and company vehicle 22.5t = 4% total
Business air travel
Total scope 3 Business travel, freight, commuting, waste, water supply etc 447t = 86% total
Air freight
8%
Sea freight
21%
5% 7%
• As we rapidly grow as a business (30% sales increase year on year) our absolute carbon footprint is growing too. In the lead up to the United Nations COP21 climate negotiations we committed to setting science based reduction targets over the next 2 years20 which we will be setting this year
37%
11%
Sea freight Other freight
Community
36%
Commuting Air freight
Business land travel
16%
22%
Business land Travel Total scope 2 Electricity supply 57.52t = 10% total
Business air travel
1%
12% 6% 12%
Other
Other freight Other
• Reaching our Do Nation target to save 500,000 cups of tea worth of carbon over the year from Pukka employees making simple pledges to make small, sustainable changes in our daily lives. You can follow our progress at: https:// www.wearedonation.com/businesses/pukka-herbs/
Our absolute carbon use is increasing but our carbon intensity is reducing. We have seen a growth in business air travel as we grow internationally. Likewise, our commuting is increasing as we grow in numbers. In one area, however, our growth has meant more efficiencies. For our land, sea and air freight our increased volumes mean containers and trucks are more likely to be fully loaded. In addition we have been working on simplifying and standardising our supply chain and have become better at predicting demand given our fast pace of growth.
20 http://sciencebasedtargets.org/companies-taking-action/ We joined over 118 other companies committed to taking action in the lead up to COP21 http:// www.cop21paris.org/ which took place in December 2015.
26
27
Resource conservation We only have one planet, and we work to keep it Pukka by measuring and reducing our operational waste. We send zero waste to landfill and strive to continuously improve our packaging impacts. We are dependent upon the planet’s capacity to provide resources to help make our products. Things we take for granted like fresh water, sunlight and air to grow our herbs. The planet also provides unseen but essential ‘services’ with its ability to absorb pollution and waste. If we take too many resources or emit excessive pollutants the planet can’t cope. Contaminants to land, air and water can have serious effects on human health and security of food and water supplies and can also result in loss of biodiversity. We continue to implement our sustainable waste management strategy developed last year that follows the waste management hierarchy (reduce, reuse, recycle, recover). From our choice of eco cleaning supplies and 100% recycled office paper we make daily decisions at Pukka to limit our burden on the planet. We continuously improve our packaging to both increase its ability to be recovered and to find creative ways to reduce the quantity used, whilst always providing a top quality product that delights our consumers. Working to eliminate plastic from our supply chain is a key target. Switching to single polymer or bioplastics to enable recovery is an important first step. The materials we source must also be free from Genetically Modified Organisms (Non-GM/GMO Free) under our obligations as an Organic company.
Achievements 2016
28
1
2
Beautiful events that tread lightly
Forest of Avon Trust: Festive donation
29
Key performance indicators We purchased 424 reams of paper in FY16. This is equivalent to 4.6 reams per person per year21 (down from 5.14 in FY15). In 2011 an independent environmental audit found that our usage was 14 reams per person per year.
1
Beautiful events that tread lightly
Our offices used a total of 570 cubic metres of water in FY16. This is equivalent to 6.12 per person (down from 6.51 per person in FY15). In 2011 an environmental audit found that our usage was 7.7 per person per year. Figure 1 shows the % waste produced by type of waste and management method.
Pukka has worked hard this year to bring the incredible power of plants to life at music festivals and other events. We take a sustainable event management approach to planning, organising and delivering all the events we go to. Our Pukka creations are made from sustainably sourced materials. Wherever possible we re-use materials for as long as we can. At events, we aim to ensure no waste goes to landfill and reduce single-use plastic wherever we can – from the compostable paper cups we provide our tea samples in through to our use of string instead of single use plastic cable ties.
Total waste produced by management method (tonnes)
Landfill FY14: 13% FY 15&16: 0%
Energy Recovery FY14: 16% FY 15&16: 43%
Reused FY14: 6% FY 15: 8% FY 16: 3%
FY14 FY16
Recycled FY14: 65% FY15: 49% FY 15: 8% FY 16: 54%
We are a zero waste to landfill business and have been since FY15. Our contractor sends monthly waste reports to help us monitor our waste management hierarchy. The majority of our waste is reused or recycled, and our recycling rates are recovering after a dip in FY15. We hope better signage in our offices will help increase recycling rates in FY17. We continue to support reuse charities such as Children’s Scrapstore that use our colourful packaging for creative play across the city of Bristol.
Priorities for 2017 2
• We have focused long and hard on our own waste management in our offices and
Forest of Avon Trust: Festive donation Every year we send a festive e-greeting. The money we save from not printing and posting cards goes to the Forest of Avon Trust. One of the Trust’s principal objectives is to work with owners to get woodlands in Bristol and Avon into management. Better managed woodlands contribute more to biodiversity, provide greater pollution / environmental management and can contribute to a local sustainable timber economy. Our donation this year has enabled the charity to produce woodland management plans for two woodlands: Tania’s Wood near Ubley and Batch Wood near Churchill. The management plans will guide owners on appropriate management for the next 10 years (and beyond) and will enable them to apply for grants to support work in the future. “The Forest of Avon Trust is extremely grateful for Pukka Herbs’ sponsorship, which now means that woodland management plans have been produced for 850ha of local woodland.” Jon Clark, Executive Director- Forest of Avon Trust
•
warehouses, and we’re pretty proud of what we have achieved. This year, we plan to continue to work with our suppliers to learn together how to cut waste further. Investigating the amount of embedded water in our products - in other words, the water needed to grow the herbs and make our health supplements and tea. This is likely to be more than we use in our operations.
21 93 full time equivalent employees in 2016
30
31
Sustainable communities We are passionate about improving the lives of everyone who comes into contact with us, whether they are in the fields growing our incredible organic herbs, or are in our local community of Bristol. We recognise our role as a community member of Bristol, UK and our responsibilities as a job provider, procurer of goods and services and provider of health products. We also recognise our responsibilities as a global citizen and our impact on the communities of our value chain. Many of our team members live locally. We source several services within Bristol including our cleaning company, refuse service and organic fruit supplier and use some local logistics, packaging and marketing suppliers. We sponsor many local events and donate tea and funds to charitable organisations in the UK and overseas. We focus on supporting events and organisations that promote health and those focused on caring for the planet as part of our 1% for the Planet commitment.
Achievements 2016 1 Building resilient communities through fair trade premiums
3
Sustrans: Partnership Update
32
2
Eden Project: Partnership Update
4
The Hartcliffe Health and Environment Action Group: Kitchen on Prescription (KOP) pilot
33
Midland Road Bridge after
Midland Road Bridge before
1
Building resilient communities through fair trade premiums In 2016 we continued to invest in communities via our fair certification. All fair certification schemes include a ‘premium fund’ to benefit local families and community life. In 2016 the sourcing team visited fair certified projects in seven different countries. One of our priorities when we visit fair projects is to learn more about how the community has been spending, or plans to spend the premium fund. As one would expect with suppliers from many different countries, the social needs and the uses of the premiums are very diverse. For many communities, the priority is to keep increasing production and improving the quality of the fair certified produce; for example, farmers in India, Turkey and China have all chosen to invest in producing compost; in Bosnia and Hungary they have used the fund to invest in improved drying facilities. For others, the fund is best spent on improving their working conditions. Interestingly, FairWild licorice collectors in Spain, Georgia and Kazakhstan all came up with the same idea of investing in a caravan, where they can take shelter from the searing sun. This gives an insight into the habitat of wild licorice and the hard work that goes into harvesting its roots. In other communities, the premium fund is an opportunity to meet their basic needs, such as building and repairing roads and bridges in Vietnam, or firewood for heating during the winter in Bosnia and Poland. In Bosnia and Georgia, the FairWild collectors decided to use the money to fund dental treatment. In Georgia, we were greeted by a family of licorice collectors with huge smiles sparkling with golden crowns, evidently very happy with their share of the fair premium fund!
3
Sustrans Partnership Update With Sustrans we have been working to increase the number journeys people make by bicycle through supporting the Cycle Network. The Network passes within a mile of half of all UK homes and now stretches over 14,000 miles across the length and breadth of the UK. Almost five million people use the National Cycle Network, and despite its name, the Network isn’t just for cyclists, it’s also popular with walkers, joggers, wheelchair users and horse riders too. With Sustrans help, we identified two parts of the Network to help improve, to make sure that journeys on the National Cycle Network ensure journeys on the National Cycle Network are memorable and more than just a way of getting from A to B. The routes are also rich in wildlife and habitats and we want to help ensuring that the National Cycle Network is a place where biodiversity thrives.
1. Midland Rd Bridge, Easton, Bristol. On one of the busiest parts of the network in the UK, we
worked with a local artist and school children to create a memorable mural to celebrate the community and the plants and animals surrounding it. Partnering with the popular Bristol based e-zine Bristol 24/7, we asked Bristol residents to suggest names for the bridge. The ultimate name was chosen by the children from a shortlist.
2. Lower Sydenam train station, London. We identified a small parcel of land on a busy stretch of
the network to create a Pukka Place – an area where commuters, the local community and other cyclists and walkers can enjoy some tranquillity and experience herbs and plants growing in their native habitat.
This year we also distributed 87,000 tea samples across the network. 42,000 of these were distributed by Sustrans fundraisers along the National Cycle Network as a thank you to donors as well as an opportunity to introduce people using the cycle path to Pukka and the incredible power of plants.
2
Eden Project Partnership Update We entered the second year of our partnership with the Eden Project. Together we created a way to bring the beauty of plants and herbs to as many people as possible through the creation of a new installation at Eden – all about the wonders of herbs. The installation – a giant Pukka tea box that takes visitors on a journey of discovery – opened in the summer of 2015 and has been a popular attraction for visitors, helping to promote the wonderful power of plants to around a million visitors a year. We also created a spice exhibit within the Rainforest Biome and a herb trail throughout the site – challenging people to find 12 key herbs planted all across Eden. 34
35
5
Pukka insight A tea like no other When Ben, our sustainable herbs manager, first visited Vietnam to find out more about our Suoi Gang green tea, he encountered a few surprises: Unlike in most tea growing areas, deep in the remote hills where the H’mong live there were no tea plantations in sight. Not your normal tea bush It transpired that the tea here is not from ‘normal’ tea bushes; it’s plucked from large ancient trees that grow in the forest. Nobody knows whether the trees there are truly wild or whether they were planted by the H’mong’s ancestors, but they are hugely important in generating an income for the community.
4
The Hartcliffe Health and Environment Action Group: Kitchen on Prescription (KOP) pilot Pukka helped to fund a pilot healthy-eating cookery course for people with existing health conditions in our local community, Hartcliffe. The ten week course, for people who want to stay well and those at risk of developing health conditions, helped seven people improve their cooking skills and wellbeing journey. KOP courses support participants to take an active role in their health and wellbeing with the aim of positive permanent lifestyle changes. Courses aim to teach people and families to cook nutritious meals/dishes from scratch - giving people the knowledge, skills and motivation to create dishes that are delicious, nutritious and inexpensive which reflect the dietary and cultural needs of participants. As well as learning new skills the course provided important social benefits. One woman reported that she has not left the house alone for four years until attending this course. The Bristol Kitchen on Prescription Alliance (BKOPA) is working collaboratively and aim to roll out Bristol-wide KOP interventions as a whole-person, preventative, self-care approach to fit within a Public Health social prescribing framework.
36
Ben was curious as to why the H’mong hadn’t chosen to create tea plantations like everyone else. The answer, it turned out, was simple: Wild tea trees mostly look after themselves - no need for fertilisers, pesticides or irrigation. The villagers’ animals – mostly cows and pigs - can also graze under their canopy from the forest floor that is full of wild plants and flowers. More minerals and higher antioxidant levels Wild tea trees have longer roots to tap moisture deep underground and to access minerals in the lower layers of subsoil. These minerals improve the resilience of the trees, and also provide a more mineral-rich tea for us. Tests at Pukka have shown that our green tea from Vietnam has by far the highest levels of antioxidants of all of our teas – most likely due to the long, mineral-mining roots of these unique tea trees. Supporting the community The only downside to wild tea collection is a lower yield. But this is compensated for by Fairtrade certification, which guarantees a premium price as well as a community fund for social development. For every kilo of tea that we buy, we donate a dollar to the fund. In the last few years this money has helped build and maintain roads and bridges – a vital lifeline from the remote villages to the tea collection centre. Here the villagers can sell their tea that tastes so good in our products such as Supreme Matcha Green and Turmeric Gold. 37
Key performance indicators We invested £89,000 into communities in our supply chains through our fair trade premium payments from our Fairtrade, FairWild and Fair for Life certified suppliers. You can read about the impacts of some of these investments in the previous section. We invested 54% of our spend in local community partnerships and local sourcing within a 50 mile radius of our head office22 . Our executive board is made up of four members of whom three are from the local community.
Priorities for 2017 • Continue working with our suppliers to identify how we can help build resilient communities together either through our fair trade premiums or supply chain partnerships.
• Building creative and impactful strategic partners with our key national partnerships including The Soil Association, Sustrans and the Eden Project, as we work together to promote our People, Plants and Planet philosophy.
• We have very specialised requirements for our packers, herb suppliers and testing laboratories due to our organic status and ethical and quality requirements which makes local sourcing difficult, but we commit to building supply networks in our local community where we can. And to working with our neighbourhood community networks to help build a healthier, happier and more resilient Bristol.
22 To align with our B Lab assessment, this year we have extended our definition of local to include all spend within a 50 mile radius rather than limited to a BS and BA postcode.
38
39
Ethical practices We recognise that our business decisions have an impact on a range of stakeholders and we have a responsibility to ensure that all our decisions at Pukka are fair to people, plants and the planet. We do this by being open and honest in communications, meeting obligations and seeking and acting on feedback from our customers, suppliers, team members and other individuals and organisations. For example, we hold monthly ‘Pukka Pulse’ meetings and a suggestion box so that the opinions of all Pukka team members can be represented and acted upon to help make Pukka a great place to work. We are committed to ensuring the health, safety and welfare of our team members and protecting their freedom, equality and dignity. We source ethical products and services from ethical suppliers, including operating an ethical pension scheme. Our only lobbying activities are carried out through our membership of organisations campaigning for organics, freedom in health choices and a ban on the testing of animals. We make no political contributions.
Achievements 2016
40
1
2
Be the Changeproud to become certified B Company
VALCO: Values at the heart of our business
3
4
1% for the planet
Mindful workplace
41
1
Be the Change - proud to become a certified B Company Our founders, Tim and Sebastian, started Pukka 15 years ago with the aim of doing good through commerce. Becoming a certified B Company this year has given us a powerful platform, alongside over 1,800 other ethical and environmentally focussed businesses across 50 countries, to work together to accelerate the change we need to see in the world. The changes we need to make as a society in terms of how we support our own health and that of the planet’s need to be so vast that it’s only by joining together with other like-minded communities that we can create the paradigm shift we so urgently need. Being a B Company is also a commitment to serve society no matter what. This commitment gives all of us at Pukka both the inspiration and courage to grow what we do with the knowledge that we will always be a force for good. As a Certified B Company, we are now rigorously assessed on the mission that we were founded on: to connect people, plants and the planet through the incredible power of organic and fairly traded herbs. Being a member of B Company cements our ongoing commitment to meet higher standards of transparency, accountability and performance, offering a positive vision of a better way to do business.
Click here to view the film online
3
1% for the planet In September 2015 we signed up with 1% for the Planet, a global movement of companies donating at least 1% of their annual turnover to environmental organisations worldwide, pledging to create positive environmental change regardless of how much profit we make. Over the year we donated £400 000 to environmental charities, exceeding our 1% commitment. You can see our donation breakdown below, and some of the impacts from these donations outlined in our Communities section of this report.
2
VALCO: Values at the heart of our business During 2016 we established a new working group at Pukka: our Values Committe (VALCO for short). The purpose of this group is to ensure that the business conducts itself in accordance with its values. The groups, made up of member from across the business, set and monitor Pukka’s ‘Standards of Conduct’, develop policies and practices in the area of sustainability, set review and monitor the Pukka People surveys, and champion behaviours that make Pukka a great place to work – making recommendations to the Board where necessary.
42
4
Mindful workplace After staff consultation on wellbeing on the workplace, Pukka introduced Mindfulness training in September 2016 (just outside this report scope). Mindfulness means living our life to the full. It is an awareness developed by paying attention on purpose, in the present moment, and nonjudgementally. Mindfulness promotes a way of being that helps us to take better care of ourselves and lead healthier and more fulfilling lives. It also helps us cope effectively with stress, illness or any difficulties we encounter in our day-to-day experience. Open to all staff, the Mindfulness course lasts 8 weeks on a rolling basis, and participants are supported through their journey by Mindfulness For All coach Miro Cansky.
43
Key performance indicators
We donated £400,000 to the following charities in FY16, as verified by 1% for the Planet
Our ethical practices are measured by our performance in the B Lab assessment. In respect of our team members we track diversity, training and development, team member retention and Employee Survey results. We also report any incidents of corruption and there were none in the year. B Corp certification assessment score by B Lab: You can see our full score on the B Corp website: https:// www.bcorporation.net/community/pukka-herbs Wellbeing fund: We encourage our team members to live life well and healthily. As part of this we offer all employees the opportunity to claim 50% off the costs of any wellbeing related activity, and 75% for development, up to a maximum spend of £300 each year. Over the last year, 60 Pukka staff have used the fund, claiming a total of £6,464 for wellbeing and £4,439 for development opportunities, including gym membership, holistic treatments, sports equipment, personal training, music and sporting lessons and books. Thiere are 50% more people using it than in the previous year and more than double the amount paid out. We measure gender and age diversity of our team members as shown in Table 4 below: Category of team member
Percentage of team members Male
Female
Age under 30 Age 30-50
Aged over 50
Senior management FY14
86%
14%
0%
71%
29%
Senior management FY15
100%
0%
0%
80%
20%
Senior management
100%
0%
0%
100%
0%
Other team members FY14
33%
67%
38%
58%
4%
Other team members FY1529
35%
65%
45%
50%
5%
27
28
FY16
Other team members FY1630
35%
65%
26%
66%
8%
Phaladaayi Foundation (tree planting)
Priorities for 2017 • In house, we want Pukka to be a great place to work. We know that our rapid growth means
that there are times when Pukka asks a lot from our team members. Aligning our core values and focusing on employee wellbeing are of paramount importance as our growth continues. With the Eden project, we have developed Chrysalis, a personal and organisational development programme arranged over four days and three nights at the Eden Project facilitated by their HotHouse Creative Leadership Team. Over the course of six months, approximately 100 Pukka employees will be immersed into the extraordinary environments of the Eden Project to learn about and discover more of their, and Pukka’s, future place in the world. The programme will be grounded in Pukka’s Wisdom Seeds (see page 12) and the key idea that extraordinary things can happen when amazing people are brought together in inspiring surroundings.
• We will join the B Corp Inclusion Challenge launched at the end of 2016 (so just outside this
report scope), setting diversity based targets in 2017 and reporting on progress through the B Lab assessment tool.
Our team member turnover rate increased from 23% in FY15 to 24% in FY16. In our employee survey, 72% of respondents agreed that “Pukka is a great place to work”, up from 47% the year before.
23242526
Prior
23 FY 15Board & Operating Committee: 5 members 24 FY 15Board & Operating Committee: 5 members 25 76 team members 26 Note our Fair for Life certification fee is not eligible for 1% as IMO the certifier are not a charity. Counted in our 1% donation is the premium payment that goes directly to benefit farmers and their communities only
44
45
Progress towards a Pukka Planet Our mission to bring the power and magic of herbs into people’s lives to help them and the planet live a healthier life progressed significantly in 2016 with increased growth of our ethical trade, achieving our target for our teas to be 100% fair certified by end 2016. We made improvements across our five sustainability themes. We’ve responded to the global challenge of climate change and brought forward our ambitious goal to be carbon neutral across our entire value chain from crop to cup by 15 years to 2030. We recognise however that we have significant challenges to overcome regarding the delivery of our mission. As we acknowledged in last year’s report, issues such as addressing climate change impacts are too big to tackle alone. Becoming a certified B Corp has given us a powerful platform, alongside over 1800 other ethical businesses globally, to create the change we need to see in the world. The changes we need to make as a society in terms of how we support our own health and that of the planet’s need to be so vast that it’s only by joining together with other like-minded communities that we can create the paradigm shift we so urgently need. As well as finalising our net positive strategy, we hope next year to make further improvements in our stakeholder dialogue (working more formally the people and communities that our business touches to identify issues and find solutions together), data gathering and reporting, which we commit to improving in 2017/18 and beyond, and which will be helped significantly by the company wide introduction of a new management system IFS in 2017. We commit to 1% for the Planet for a second year, committing to donate 1% of our turnover to environmental charities annually regardless of how much profit we make.
46
47
Appendix 1 Social Mission Pukka Herbs was founded in 2001 with the purpose of bringing the incredible power of plants to as wide a community as possible to inspire them to lead a more conscious life. We create delicious teas and incredible wellbeing supplements, helping millions of people worldwide to discover a healthier, happier life. This social mission is our commitment to benefitting people as part of doing business. We recognise that our business has a direct impact on the wellbeing of our employees, customers, suppliers and wider communities in Bristol and the UK. Also, through our sourcing as well as our global distribution, our activities impact positively on communities all over the world. Pukka is committed to being a socially responsible business. We strive every day to help create a Pukka Planet benefiting people, plants and planet. The word ‘pukka’ means ‘genuine and authentic’ and it’s at the heart of everything we do. From the incredible 100% organic herbs we use, carefully sourced from over 50 countries worldwide, to the fact that all our teas and an increasing number of our supplements are Fair for Life certified. We engage our culture with what we call ‘The Wisdom Seeds’. These are the universal wisdom principles of Truth, Respect, Purity and Effort. Our social mission is inspired by the Hindi proverb “Help your brother’s boat across and your own will reach the shore”. Pukka is growing fast as a business and we want to make sure that we grow together with the people who we work with and who work for us. We want to ensure that everyone in our value chain, or as we say ‘from crop to cup’, benefits from the power of plants and working with us. We call this creating circles of benevolence by using business as a force for positive social and environmental change. As part of our sustainability vision, we strive to have a demonstrable net positive impact on people, plants and planet.
Our People We commit to being a socially responsible employer, caring about the individual, the environment, the community and the planet. This manifests itself clearly in our People strategy which is: To recruit and retain passionate people inspired by nature to deliver exceptional service and inspire people to live a more conscious life:
1. Developing Expert Herbal Knowledge – we will lead the field and be the go to experts for
2.
3.
4.
48
all things Herbal, with the intention of retaining 20% of our staff with qualifications in herbal medicine and plant sciences including pharmacogsony, botany, horticulture, organic agronomy and nutrition. Developing our people – Our Learning & Development programme has four areas of focus Personal development, Professional development, Sustainability and Health & Wellbeing. We will improve people’s wellbeing through helping to develop their mind, body, spirit and environment- this includes a unique benefits package (Wellbeing & Development Fund, Monthly Pukka Allowance) as well as Cycle to Work Scheme, Annual Company Bonus, ethical pension scheme, provision of regular development activities and less traditional ones such as Yoga, Mindfulness and the Pukka Life Academy (90% of staff have either completed or are engaged in our one year ‘Herbologist’ training). Facilitating a flexible environment – we don’t have the capacity to be all things to all people, so we will be flexible about what we can be. “How we can, not why we can’t” becomes our mantra, including committing to Living Wage and going beyond our statutory obligations in some areas such as maternity and paternity leave; Become a destination employer – we want people to care about what we care about and therefore want to join our team.
Community: Our customers We commit to helping people discover a healthier, happier life through experiencing our teas and supplements and by sharing our herbal expertise. Our herbs are expertly blended using the wisdom of India’s ancient health system, Ayurveda, by our master herbsmith Sebastian Pole. This means that every Pukka herbal blend is created with its associated health benefits in mind. Inherent in Pukka’s values, we also commit to transparency, honesty and clarity in all our communications and information we provide to our customers and consumers. It is important to us that our customers understand what we already do well, and what we (and they) think we could do better, and how we aspire to achieve that. We achieve this in many ways, including through our Customer Services team, social media, sustainability report and the Pukka Planet and FAQ sections of our website.
Plants and our supplier communities: sourcing and purchasing herbs All activities related to sourcing of herbs for Pukka’s teas and supplements are guided by the four principles of organic farming: health, ecology, fairness and care. The health and safety of suppliers, staff and customers are ensured through rigorous quality assurance systems, including organic certification and testing the quality of every ingredient. We commit to using ‘Fair’ certified ingredients where the need of the community along with the quality and availability are appropriate. Fair certification provides a framework to ensure social responsibility across the supply chain. Where ‘Fair’ certification is not appropriate we will always engage fairly with our suppliers. We maintain a culture of transparency, trust and integrity. All supplier relationships are based on Pukka’s principles of partnership with emphasis on supporting indigenous people, farm labourers and women with fair prices and long-term commitments. We believe the health of the individual is inseparable from the health of the environment, and therefore strive to support both equally through our organic and fair sourcing. We strive to reduce carbon emissions, minimise waste and conserve resources, and to help communities adapt to the challenges of climate change.
Planet: Sourcing and purchasing all other materials We commit to ensuring that the items we purchase and the materials we use have the best possible impact on People and Planet. We seek Suppliers who share these goals and provide us with innovative solutions to support our growth. With the goal of recyclable packaging and reducing plastic, one of our key aims is to launch a recyclable tea envelope by end 2018. All manufacturing sites meet international standards on ethical working and child labour. We also aim to work with suppliers who are compliant with either ISO14001 or are Carbon Neutral. We want all our partners to benefit from Pukka’s growth and success by innovating together. We work to deliver the mutual success of all partners in Pukka’s supply chain and will establish balanced performance scorecards with our suppliers to celebrate success and guide improvement. We commit to communicating this policy and its values to our team members, suppliers and other stakeholders and publically via our website Pukka Planet. We will review this policy annually as part of our ‘For Life’ certification process. ‘For Life’ is a third-party verification that Pukka is a socially responsible business throughout our entire supply chain. For our other policies, including our Sustainability, Climate Change, and Sourcing policies, please see our 2015 Sustainability report online at www.pukkaherbs.com
49
A big Pukka thanks to‌ Everyone at Pukka, our committed suppliers and our customers around the world for supporting our vision to create a Pukka Planet beneďŹ ting people, plants and planet.
co p
@pukkaherbs discover more at pukkaherbs.com
50