Dairy Cooperatives Make Public Sustainability Commitment to Walmart
June 6, 2017
During Walmart’s Sustainability Milestone Summit in April, NMPF member cooperatives Dairy Farmers of America and Land O’Lakes, Inc. announced their participation in Project Gigaton. The initiative aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from key Walmart vendor operations and supply chains by one gigaton by 2030. Both cooperatives will use the new FARM Environmental Stewardship module to help track and communicate their continuous improvement regarding greenhouse gas emissions reductions occurring on dairy farms.
Project Gigaton identifies energy, agriculture, waste, packaging, deforestation, and product use and design as areas in which to focus emissions reduction efforts. Both DFA’s and Land O’Lakes’ commitments focus on manure management as one of the areas to track continuous improvement on dairy farms. Other areas highlighted include improved yield potential, farm efficiency, and reducing enteric emissions associated with ruminant digestion.
The FARM Environmental Stewardship tool estimates greenhouse gas emissions and energy intensity by using the results from a dairy life cycle assessment conducted by the Applied Sustainability Center at the University of Arkansas. FARM Environmental Stewardship is a voluntary tool available to all FARM Program participants.
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