As one of only two national grocery retailers in Canada, Sobeys Inc. serves the food shopping needs of Canadians with more than 1,500 stores in all 10 provinces under the retail banners that include Sobeys, Safeway, IGA, Foodland, FreshCo, Price Chopper, Thrifty Foods and Lawtons Drugs, as well as more than 330 retail fuel locations. Our five core retail food formats are designed to ensure that we have the right offering in the right-sized stores for each individual market we serve ? from our full service format to the convenience format, each tailored to satisfy the unique occasion-based food shopping needs of our customers. A proudly Canadian company with more than 107 years in the food business, Sobeys Inc. is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Empire Company Limited, headquartered in Stellarton, Nova Scotia. Our 125,000 employees and franchise affiliates are committed to building sustainable worth for each of our customers, employees, suppliers and shareholders through our focus on food, innovation and superior customer service.
Sobeys commitment through it's membership in The Consumer Good Forum is to ensure that all the palm oil used in our store brand products is responsibly sourced. The company is currently promoting this commitment through internal communications, with particular focus and attention paid to product procurement and new product development staff. More specifically an internal sustainability training program highlights the impact of tropical deforestation and the commodities (including palm oil) that can contribute to this.The purpose of this internal engagement will be to ensure that responsible procurement of palm oil is discussed and promoted when engaging with suppliers, vendors, and other key stakeholders.
Sobeys has gone through a systematic process to determine which of the company's private label products currently contain palm oil, as well as the specific quantities contained in each. The next step is for Sobeys to review the list with vendor-facing staff. Following that we will be contacting vendors directly to ensure (or transition) their products to sustainability produced palm oil.
Due to the complex, global nature of the palm oil supply chain, Sobeys supports a precompetitive, collaborative approach to working with stakeholders at the international level to drive change toward sustainable palm oil production. Having said that, we would rely on the RSPO to help resolve any conflicts in producing areas in the unlikely event that becomes an issue.
Sobeys is committed to the monitoring and transparent reporting of the amount of palm oil and palm oil derivatives used in our private label products. We will continue to track these amounts on a yearly basis, and compare against the benchmark calculated in 2013.
Sobeys has committed to zero-deforestation within our supply chain for our private label products by 2020. As such, Sobeys is committed to working with our suppliers to ensure the RSPO Principles and Criteria are adhered to, as we work towards the 2020 goal. In addition, Sobeys plans to purchase GreenPalm certificates covering 100% of our 2014 usage of palm oil and palm oil derivatives, as a first step toward achieving a mass balance within our supply chain.
Our internal measurement system will allow us to track private label supplier usage of palm oil, explore in more detail their supply chains, and confirm with them that they are in compliance with the Principles and Criteria.
By joining the RSPO Sobeys would hope to gain access to the most accurate and current information on the palm oil industry to assist us in our sourcing decisions.