Message from our CEO
We want to create a better future for millions of people and help to improve their quality of life.
Two billion consumers worldwide use a Unilever product on any given day
Our products make small but important differences to the quality of people’s everyday lives. We have ambitious plans to grow our company. In fact, we intend to double our sales. This growth will create jobs and income for all those whose livelihoods are linked to our success – our employees, our suppliers, our customers, our investors and hundreds of thousands of farmers around the world.
Sustainable growth
But growth at any cost is not viable. We have to develop new ways of doing business which will increase the positive social benefits arising from Unilever’s activities while at the same time reducing our environmental impacts. We want to be a sustainable business in every sense of the word.
We do not believe there is a conflict between sustainability and profitable growth. The daily act of making and selling consumer goods drives economic and social progress. There are billions of people around the world who deserve the better quality of life that everyday products like soap, shampoo and tea can provide.
Creating a better future
Our vision is to create a better future in which people can improve their quality of life without increasing their environmental footprint. Our strategy is to increase our social impacts by ensuring that our products meet the needs of people everywhere for balanced nutrition, good hygiene and the confidence which comes from having clean clothes, clean hair and good skin.
But we recognise that in order to live within the natural limits of the planet we will have to decouple growth from environmental impact. This starts with our own operations. We will achieve absolute reductions in greenhouse gases (GHGs), water and waste. In particular we will meet the United Nations’ requirement* to reduce GHGs by 50-85% by 2050 in order to limit global temperature rise to two degrees.
However, our impact goes beyond our factory gates. The sourcing of raw materials and the use of our products by the consumer at home have a far larger footprint. We recognise this and so our Plan is designed to reduce our impacts across the whole lifecycle of our products. Innovation and technology will be key to achieving these reductions.
The Unilever Sustainable Living Plan
The Unilever Sustainable Living Plan will result in three significant outcomes by 2020.
We will help more than 1 billion people take action to improve their health and well-being.
We will halve the environmental footprint of the making and use of our products.
We will source 100% of our agricultural raw materials sustainably.
Delivering these commitments will not be easy. To achieve them we will have to work in partnership with governments, NGOs, suppliers and others to address the big challenges which confront us all. Ultimately we will only succeed if we inspire billions of people around the world to take the small, everyday actions that add up to a big difference – actions that will enable us all to live more sustainably.
Paul Polman
CEO
March 2011
* Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Fourth Assessment Report, 2007
