Danone's Horizon Organic, the largest organic dairy brand in the world, is committing to becoming carbon positive by 2025. Its goal is to become the first national dairy brand to be carbon positive across its full supply chain.
Mariano Lozano, CEO of Danone, told Cheddar on Wednesday that the ambitious plan is an "unprecedented move."
"We are committing to have full scope, meaning from farm to table, to become carbon positive. That means for us going beyond carbon neutrality, to reduce, remove, and offset all of our carbon emission for 2025," Lozano said.
Over the next five years, the company intends to focus on the following four areas: supporting family farmers, carbon-reduction on-farm practices, off-farm actions, and investing in carbon reductions and offsets.
The dairy company will also pledge $15 million from its Horizon Farmer Investment Fund to support farmers across the country to help implement more sustainable farming practices.
"We need to work very closely with our farmer partners. We work together with more than 600 family farmer partners," he said of the farms that produce nearly two-thirds of Horizon's carbon footprint. "It is paramount to support them on how to roll out what we call regenerative agriculture practices."
The CEO does admit it is "unchartered territory," but explained that the company is confident because it has been working to achieve this goal for a long time.
"We are quite bullish because we've been working with this for a long time, even though it is honest to say that we do not have all the answers," Lozano said. "From time to time we are feeling a bit uncomfortable, but I think it is a good proof and confirmation that we are daring enough. And this is a bold statement."
