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We aim to reduce our environmental impact and embed standards through our supply chain to make better everyday health more sustainable by:

  • Tackling carbon emissions
  • Making our packaging more sustainable
  • Sourcing trusted ingredients more sustainably
  • Integrating water stewardship and waste circularity in our operations.

Making better everyday health more sustainable is fundamental to our business. Millions of people are directly impacted by the effects of climate change and other environmental issues, so working to minimise our impact on the environment is becoming increasingly urgent given the limited time available to turn the tide on climate change and on nature and biodiversity loss. Our long-term aim is to achieve net zero carbon emissions from source to sale by 2040, aligned to guidance from The Climate Pledge and Race to Zero.1

We’re working to embed sustainability into everything we do through:

  • Transparent reporting of our environmental footprint and our progress towards our goals. This is overseen by an Environment Steering Committee which reviews strategic environmental management priorities, as well as monitoring progress against our environmental goals via Haleon’s responsible business scorecards. Reflecting the strategic importance of Haleon’s environmental commitments, Haleon has established the Environmental and Social Sustainability Board Committee to provide oversight and effective governance at Board-level.
  • The use of a sustainability impact assessment tool for all innovation projects which enables teams to evaluate the impact of choices made during the product design process to understand if their environmental impact is the same, better or worse than previous products. Only projects scoring “same” or “better” should be approved unless there is a strong rationale for exceptions. In 2024 we will set targets for the percentage of products scoring “better,” with the aim of increasing them over time.
  • Haleon’s Environmental Sustainability Policy, which outlines our environmental standards and commitments.

  • Carbon scope 1 & 2 emissions

    Our Goal: We aim to reduce our net Scope 1 and 2 carbon emissions by 100% by 2030 vs. a 2020 baseline.2

    Scope 1 and 2 emissions are those generated by activities in Haleon’s operational control, either from the direct burning of fossil fuels or indirectly from the energy we procure. They make up about 8% of our total value chain carbon footprint. Our Scope 1 and 2 carbon reduction strategy focuses on three areas:

    • Decarbonising our heat production by electrifying our heat, switching fuels, and abating any remaining emissions through additional and high-quality carbon offsets.
    • Reducing our energy consumption by switching to renewable energy sources for our electricity, through installation of renewable energy sources on or near our sites, or by procuring renewable electricity.
    • Driving energy reduction through energy efficiency and management programmes.

    2 Our goal to reduce net Scope 1 and 2 carbon emissions by 100% by 2030 is underpinned by a 95% absolute reduction target. 

  • Carbon scope 3 emissions 

    Our Goal: We aim to reduce our Scope 3 carbon emissions from source to sale by 42% by 2030 vs a 2022 baseline.3

    Scope 3 emissions are those generated throughout our supply chain, from the raw materials we use to manufacture and package our products, to the consumer use and disposal of them. Emissions generated by the raw materials, active pharmaceutical ingredients, packaging and services we buy and use to make our products make up the bulk of our carbon emissions, and are our key focus for lowering our carbon footprint. We have identified the key contributors to our Scope 3 emissions and are focused on systematically reducing their impact.

    Our Scope 3 emissions-reduction strategy is focused on three areas:

    • Optimise: short-term actions we can take to decarbonise across our value chain, driven by the co-benefits of other environmental initiatives (for example, right-sizing our packaging and switching from virgin plastic to recycled plastic) and by working with our suppliers to incentivise their transition to renewable energy.
    • Re-engineer: reducing and/or replacing carbon emission-intensive raw and packaging materials.
    • Re-invent: re-designing product formats and formulations to dramatically reduce their carbon emission footprints.

    3 Our Scope 3 carbon emissions target spans carbon emission categories from source to sale (excluding GHG protocol categories 6, 7, 10-15). It covers mandatory Scope 3 upstream and downstream emissions. It excludes indirect consumer use-phase emissions, such as emissions associated with water used with our products.

  • Plastics and Recyclable Packaging

    Virgin Plastic Reduction

    Our Goal: We aim to reduce our use of virgin petroleum-based plastic by 10% by 2025, and a third by 2030 vs a 2022 baseline.4

    We are seeking to deliver a significant virgin plastic reduction through a combination of:

    • Optimising our packaging to reduce the absolute amount of material we use through more compact design, for example, reducing headspace, and right-sizing our packaging.
    • Substituting virgin plastic with alternative resins, for example, recycled plastic and bio-resin, as alternative feedstocks to virgin petroleum-based plastic.
    • Innovating to develop new packaging formats, for example, new-to-industry technologies and materials, and new product formats, packaging solutions, and/or delivery models such as reuse and refill.

    Recyclability

    Our Goal: We aim to develop solutions for all product packaging to be recycle-readyby 2025 as part of our goal to make all packaging recyclable or reusable by 2030, where safety, quality and regulations permit.

    Making our packaging recycle-ready is a key milestone to achieving recyclability, whereby a packaging format is effectively collected, sorted and recycled in practice and at scale in at least one region.

    Our packaging content is made up of several different raw materials. Paper packaging accounts for about half of our packaging footprint, the vast majority of which is recycle-ready today. For our plastic packaging, our primary focus for recycle-ready is on our products sold in tubes and bottles as these formats account for the largest share of our plastic packaging.

    Our approach for recycle-ready is to:

    • Remove problematic plastics (for example PVC).
    • Move to mono-material packs, transitioning out of composite packaging that is hard to recycle (e.g. moving our toothpaste packaging out of aluminium barrier layer tubes into mono-material HDPE plastic tubes)
    • Pick materials that are compatible with existing and emerging recycling streams.

    4 Scope includes product packaging and some devices, including toothbrushes.

    5 Recycle-ready refers to product packaging and devices that are made of materials that are proven to be compatible with existing or emerging recycling infrastructure. In line with the CDP definition of ‘technical recyclability’, this does not take into account whether the collection, sorting and recycling of the packaging or device happens in practice, at scale, and with reasonable economics.

  • Palm oil derivatives

    The annual volume of palm oil derivatives that Haleon uses is low in comparison with total global palm oil production volumes. Nevertheless, we take our responsibility to address our impacts seriously.  We are working to sustainably source palm oil derivatives with certifications that also allow us to improve the palm oil traceability and transparency in our supply chain. We use recognised global certification programmes wherever possible, for example Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil Mass-Balance (RSPO MB). Haleon is also a member of Action for Sustainable Derivatives (ASD), a collaborative initiative that brings together companies in the cosmetics, home, personal care, and oleochemicals industries to collectively tackle supply chain issues regarding palm oil and palm kernel oil.

    Our Goal: We aim for all of our key agricultural, forest and marine-derived materials used in our ingredients and packaging to be sustainably sourced and deforestation-free by 2030.6


    6 Scope includes Haleon’s globally managed spend on key materials that are agricultural, forest, or marine-derived. Globally managed spend covers the majority of our internal spend and expands across some of our third-party manufacturing network.

  • Paper packaging 

    Paper packaging accounts for about half of our packaging footprint, the vast majority of which is recycle-ready today. Sourcing our paper packaging sustainably is also important when evaluating the environmental impact of packaging. We aim to achieve deforestation-free supply chains by 2030 for our paper-based packaging and other key forest, agriculture or marine-derived materials.7 To achieve this we are working with our suppliers, with the aim of ensuring all our paper-based packaging comes from recycled or certified sources, including Forestry Stewardship Council (FSC), Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC), or other well-recognised ‘Chain of Custody’ Certified sources.  

    Our Goal: We aim for all of our key agricultural, forest and marine-derived materials used in our ingredients and packaging to be sustainably sourced and deforestation-free by 2030. 7

    7 Scope includes Haleon’s globally managed spend on key materials that are agricultural, forest, or marine-derived. Globally managed spend covers the majority of our internal spend and expands across some of our third-party manufacturing network.

  • Mint

    In 2023 we established our Healthy Mint Supply Chain Programme, which aims to uphold robust health and safety standards in mint farming, improve farmers’ livelihoods, and support better health in mint growing communities, while reducing the environmental impact of mint production.

    Our Goal: We aim for all of our key agricultural, forest and marine-derived materials used in our ingredients and packaging to be sustainably sourced and deforestation-free by 2030.8

    8  Scope includes Haleon’s globally managed spend on key materials that are agricultural, forest, or marine-derived. Globally managed spend covers the majority of our internal spend and expands across some of our third-party manufacturing network.

    Image credit: Firmenich

  • Water

    Sustainable water management is an important part of our Responsible Business strategy. Water is a shared and precious natural resource, so we aim to ensure our water consumption is environmentally sustainable and socially equitable. We’re members of the Alliance for Water Stewardship (AWS), a global membership collaboration that includes businesses, NGOs and the public sector who adopt and promote a universal framework for the sustainable use of water to reduce their water impact.

    To protect the local environment where we operate, we’ve put responsible water and wastewater management programmes in place and set two key goals.

    Our Goals: We aim to:

    • Achieve AWS standard certification at all our manufacturing sites by 2025.
    • Achieve water neutrality at our manufacturing sites in water-stressed basins9 by 2030.

    Our manufacturing sites are seeking initial certification against the Alliance for Water Stewardship Standard (AWS) V2.0. In line with the AWS Certification Requirements, stakeholders are invited to provide their comments on the sites undergoing an AWS Audit. See below for individual announcements:

    Stakeholder Announcement Alcalá
    Stakeholder Announcement Dungarvan
    Stakeholder Announcement East Durham
    Stakeholder Announcement Guayama
    Stakeholder Announcement Jamshoro
    Stakeholder Announcement Jiutepec
    Stakeholder Announcement Kuala Lumpur
    Stakeholder Announcement Levice
    Stakeholder Announcement Montreal
    Stakeholder Announcement Mt Lavinia
    Stakeholder Announcement Nyon
    Stakeholder Announcement TSKF

    9 Determined using publicly available tools to identify water risk like the WRI Aqueduct Tool, site-specific reviews of local water risk using local data and a materiality of the risk to the business.

    Image credit: WWF South Africa

  • Operational waste

    We are working to embed circular economy principles to address waste in our own operations. We want to move our manufacturing waste towards greater circularity by certifying our sites using the TRUE (Total Resource Use and Efficiency) certification system, which seeks to change the way materials flow through society so that they are reused and recycled.

    Our Goal: We aim to achieve TRUE certification at all our manufacturing sites by 2030.


1 Our net zero target spans carbon emission categories from source to sale (excluding GHG protocol categories 6, 7, 10-15). It covers mandatory Scope 3 upstream and downstream emissions. It excludes indirect consumer use-phase emissions, such as emissions associated with water used with our products.