John Lewis Partnership: 95 Years of Sustainability
In 2023, the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service reported the first year-long breach of the Paris Agreement’s 1.5 degree warming target.
To prevent disastrous climate change, sustainable change needs to take place urgently.
With 80,000 employees and two giant retail brands, the John Lewis Partnership (JLP) has the influence to make big changes in sustainability.
The partnership has big goals to reduce its environmental impact, and is showing real initiative in its actions already.
Marija Rompani, Director of Sustainability at the John Lewis Partnership, says: “The protection and restoration of nature was a personal passion of our founder.
“It’s now a profound responsibility for the entire John Lewis Partnership.”
The John Lewis Partnership
Founded in 1929, JLP operates Waitrose supermarkets, John Lewis department stores and banking and financial services.
The partnership is owned by a trust on behalf of its employees who receive a bonus based on its profit.
It is the largest employee owned business in the UK, with total trading sales of over £12.3bn (US$15.6bn).
Founder John Spedan Lewis was a passionate naturalist, and these ideas have been brought forwards into the 21st Century.
The JLP is headquartered in London and chaired by Dame Sharon White.
The JLP’s sustainability targets
The partnership has a target to reach net zero across its own operations by 2035 and across its wider supply chain by 2050.
These targets have been validated by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi).
It is also the first retailer in the world to have SBTi validated targets focused on greenhouse gas emissions originating from ‘forests, land and agriculture’.
Simon Winch, Environment Lead at the John Lewis Partnership, says: “Coming up with a set of credible targets for our road to net-zero is the culmination of many months of focused work and determined preparation.
“Validation by SBTi gives us great confidence in the targets and our plans.
“But we know this is only the start. The validation of our science-based targets will turbocharge the change needed in our business to transform how we operate and help ensure that the world remains in sight of limiting global warming to no more than 1.5°C.”
The JLP’s Plan for Nature
The JLP’s sustainability strategy, called ‘Our Plan for Nature’, details how it will reach its ambitious environmental goals.
Marija explains: “Reaching net-zero by 2050 means transforming our business in every way, from how we design our goods to last, how we and our suppliers power our farms, factories and stores, and how we make it easier for our customers to make more sustainable choices.
“To be the first retailer globally to set forest, land and agriculture science-based targets gives us great pride. It will be the bedrock of our plans to protect and restore nature and tackle the climate crisis over the years to come.”
The JLP has partnered with the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) to protect and restore nature in two of its key sourcing regions.
As part of this, it is investing £2m (US$2.5m) to fund ecosystem protection and regeneration projects in the areas.
The plan also includes regenerative farming. Jemima Jewell, Head of Agriculture and Responsible Sourcing at John Lewis Partnership, says: “We committed to support our more than 2,000 British farmers and producers to move to farm regeneratively, aiming to help to boost farms’ financial resilience over the long-term, while helping to combat the effects of climate change, and protecting and restoring nature.”
Jemima will be speaking at Sustainability LIVE London next month in a panel focussed on sustainable supply chains.
The partnership is also ensuring a ‘human rights lens’ is applied to any activities designed to mitigate and adapt to climate change or biodiversity loss in its supply chains.
It worked with PwC and Farm Africa to support two pieces of research exploring the current impacts of climate change and future implications of net zero strategies on women farmers and workers in its Kenyan value chains.
The JLP also launched the John Lewis Partnership Foundation, combining previous work from the John Spedan Lewis Foundation and the Building Happier Futures initiative to share the skills and resources in the JLP.
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