It means something to me. Someone with CLOUT is making a start and they are willing to help it happen rather than MANDATE it to their suppliers.
Kind of unusual and long overdue in the good old USA.
Roy
Mike Weaver <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Hogwash.
USDA Organic doesn't MEAN ANYTHING.
Keith Addison wrote:
>http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/03/24/D8GI7S484.html
>
>Wal-Mart's Organics Could Shake Up Retail
>
>Mar 24 6:17 PM US/Eastern
>
>By MARCUS KABEL
>Associated Press Writer
>
>BENTONVILLE, Ark.
>
>Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is throwing its weight behind organic products,
>a move that experts say could have the same lasting effect on
>environmental practices that Wal-Mart has had on prices by forcing
>suppliers and competitors to keep up.
>
>Putting new items on the shelf this year, from organic cotton baby
>clothes to ocean fish caught in ways that don't harm the environment,
>is part of a broader green policy launched last year to meet consumer
>demand, cut costs for things like energy and packaging and burnish a
>battered reputation.
>
>Organic products are one lure for the more affluent shoppers Wal-Mart
>is trying to woo away from rivals like Target Corp., said Alice
>Peterson, president of Chicago-based consultancy Syrus Global.
>
>A new Supercenter that opened this week in the Dallas suburb of Plano
>features over 400 organic foods as part of an experiment to see what
>kinds of products and interior decor can grab the interest of upscale
>shoppers.
>
>"Like many big companies, they have figured out it is just good
>marketing and good reputation building to be in favor of things that
>Americans are increasingly interested in," Peterson said.
>
>Wal-Mart's Lee Scott is not the first chief executive to advocate
>sustainability, a term for the corporate ethos of doing business in a
>way that benefits the environment. Industrial giant General Electric
>Co., for example, last year launched a program called "Ecomagination"
>to bring green technologies like wind power to market.
>
>What makes Wal-Mart's efforts unique, sustainability experts say, is
>the retailer's sheer size and the power that gives it in relations
>with suppliers. Wal-Mart works closely with suppliers to shape their
>goods, if they want them on the shelves of Wal-Mart's nearly 4,000
>U.S. stores and over 2,200 internationally.
>
>"They have huge potential because it's not just Wal-Mart we're
>talking about, it's their entire supply chain," said Jeff Erikson,
>U.S. director of London-based consultancy and research group
>SustainAbility. The group says it does not do any consulting work for
>Wal-Mart.
>
>Erikson said Wal-Mart could bring the same pressure it has exerted
>over the years on prices and apply that to pushing manufacturers and
>competitors to adopt more sustainable business practices and larger
>organic offerings.
>
>"We love to see companies like Wal-Mart taking a big step and making
>pronouncements as they have, because their tentacles are so large,"
>Erikson said.
>
>Wal-Mart plans to double its organic grocery offerings in the next
>month and continue looking for more products to offer in areas such
>as grocery, apparel, paper and electronics.
>
>Stephen Quinn, vice president of marketing, told an analysts'
>conference this month that Wal-Mart would have 400 organic food items
>in stores this summer "at the Wal-Mart price."
>
>Some Wal-Mart critics call the effort just a public relations job.
>But others say Wal-Mart could make a real difference if the retailer
>brings a critical mass of organic products to market and pushes
>enough suppliers to adopt green practices.
>
>Sierra Club executive director Carl Pope, who is a board member of
>the union-backed group Wal-Mart Watch that criticizes the retailer,
>said it is too soon to tell if Wal-Mart will deliver but that the
>impact could be good for the environment.
>
>"I think the direction they've said is a positive direction. The
>question is, `Are they are going to go there strongly enough?'" Pope
>said.
>
>Some of the new items will be seafood caught in the wild. Wal-Mart
>last month announced a plan to have all its wild-caught fish, which
>accounts for about a third of seafood sales, certified by the Marine
>Stewardship Council as caught in a sustainable way.
>
>The London-based MSC, founded in 1997 as a venture of the
>conservation group World Wildlife Fund and global consumer products
>company Unilever, issues the certificates to let consumers know which
>fisheries avoid overfishing and use methods that don't damage the
>ocean environment.
>
>Sustainability experts say what makes this program interesting is
>that Wal-Mart will work with its suppliers to get more fisheries
>around the globe certified by MSC, instead of just buying up the
>existing stock of certified fish.
>
>Wal-Mart says this means there will be more sustainable fish that
>will also be available to Wal-Mart's competitors, such as Whole Foods
>Market, which already sells about 18 MSC certified items, according
>to the MSC Web site. Wal-Mart plans to offer between 200 and 250
>items.
>
>The way Wal-Mart hatched the fish plan is typical of how it operates.
>
>Peter Redmond, vice president and divisional merchandise manager in
>charge of deli and seafood, said he conceived the idea after meeting
>MSC board chairman Will Martin last fall. Wal-Mart and MSC worked out
>details and then Wal-Mart called in its 25 to 30 fish wholesalers in
>January to tell them it was switching to MSC certified seafood.
>
>Wal-Mart developed a plan to work with its suppliers to encourage
>fisheries to adopt MSC practices. The plan includes barring its
>suppliers from switching fisheries in the first year to 18 months,
>giving the suppliers more reason to promote the changes.
>
>"We don't want to walk away from a fishery just because it is in
>fairly poor shape or poor shape," Redmond said. "We want to try and
>recover that (non-certified) fishery to where it becomes a
>sustainable fishery. Our point being that if we just go for
>sustainable fisheries, it won't be enough at the end of the day
>unless we recover a lot of these that are in trouble now," he added.
>
>The term fishery refers to a particular species of fish and the fleet
>that harvests them. Redmond said about 60 percent of the fisheries
>that Wal-Mart buys from now can be brought up to MSC standards within
>a year or two, and the remainder may need three to five years to
>change.
>
>Redmond says the decision to go with sustainable fish came after Lee
>Scott launched the environmental policy last fall and fits Scott's
>maxim of "doing well by doing good".
>
>"The environmental piece is a company (policy) plank. Secondly and
>probably the main reason is, when I look at seafood now and how many
>dollars it does now and how many dollars it's going to do in four
>years, I'm extremely concerned that that product is simply not going
>to be there."
>
>"So we have to take the position that if I want to have hake five or
>six years from now, we as a company have to get involved and do
>something because I don't think it'll be there for us otherwise,"
>Redmond said.
>
>Copyright 2006 The Associated Press.
>
>
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