The E-CO2 showcases the McDonald’s Beef Efficiency Tool at the Houses of Parliament
Above: Andy Wynne of E-CO2 demonstrating the E-CO2 Beef Efficiency Tool to Owen Paterson, Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. From left: Joy Clachan (McDonald’s Head of Assurance, Owen Paterson (Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs), Andy Wynne (E-CO2) and Stephen Hobbs (SBC Farmer, Buckinghamshire)
Andy Wynne from E-CO2 headed down to Westminster to a British Retail Consortium (BRC) event to launch their latest report, A Better Retailing Climate: Driving Resource Efficiency. McDonald’s and E-CO2 used the event to launch the McDonald’s Beef Efficiency Tool, a tool which was developed solely by E-CO2 to help farmers review and evaluate their current economic and environmental performance. The ‘What If?’ calculator within the tool can then be used to demonstrate the potential financial and environmental benefits to farmers who produce beef as efficiently as possible. Building on the lessons learnt from thousands of on-farm carbon assessments, users of the tool can quantify the carbon and financial savings that can be made by impacting upon a number of key production factors.
The McDonald’s Beef Efficiency Tool is freely available online via the following website: McDonalds.eco2project.com
A Better Retailing Climate is a voluntary initiative that sets out the collective ambitions of a group of BRC members, McDonald’s is a member of this group and used the opportunity to showcase their work to lower greenhouse gas emissions in the supply chain and increase resource efficiency. E-CO2 have been actively involved in the work by McDonald’s to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of their beef supply chain and also to help farmers produce beef more sustainably.
The launch involved a keynote speech from Owen Patterson which he used to congratulate members for their achievements in not only meeting but exceeding their reduction targets set in the five key areas – buildings, refrigeration, transport, water and waste over the last five years. Other BRC members who were also involved in the presentations included Tesco, Sainsbury’s, B&Q, Boots, Morrisons, M&S and many more high street retailers.
The BRC report contained a number of case studies which bring to life the achievements members have made. The E-CO2 tool featured in one of these case studies with Buckinghamshire farmer Stephen Hobbs who has been part of the Sustainable Beef Club for the past 5 years and actively uses the tool to help him make more informed management decisions. Stephen was also present at the launch to demonstrate the tool, alongside Andy Wynne, which received excellent feedback during the day. Attendees were impressed with its simplicity and user friendly visuals but also the depth of calculations and data that drives the tool.
The British Retail Consortium report, A Better Retailing Climate; Driving Resource Efficiency is available at http://www.brc.org.uk/brc_show_document.asp?id=4434&moid=8074