As part of its review of portfolio values, the Investment Committee at Paris-based asset manager La Financière Responsable has updated its analysis of the French distribution group Carrefour.
The company is often criticized, but it has emerged as an exemplary actor in terms of ESG practices and communication. LFR now ranks it as a sector leader, according to LFR’s proprietary socially responsible investment methodology. Carrefour’s ESG indicators are consistent with the volume/cost strategy identified: it has young and mostly female staff, part-time, with the high staff turnover rate specific to the sector. The company figures show progress both at the social level, such as training efforts and reduction of accidents at work, and at the environmental level, such as the active approach to reducing energy consumption and reducing CO2 emissions from the value chain.
The group demonstrates a strong involvement in the management of its ESG issues, evident in the setting of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (six out of 17). The remuneration of Executive Committee members now also includes objectives related to the implementation of the Group's approach to corporate social responsibility(CSR). A CSR Committee has also been set up to ensure that the strategy and objectives are aligned. At the beginning of the year Carrefour announced a major restructuring plan that does not involve forced departures. At the end of April, the group signed two major agreements with several unions on safeguarding employment and the voluntary redundancy.
La Financière Responsable continues to follow Carrefour’s progress.
La Financière Responsable is a specialist ESG asset manager with an award-winning approach to integrating financial and extra financial analysis. Investors and analysts are sometimes unsure as to what constitutes extra financial information, and how it should be interpreted. Drawing from its Ecosocial Footprint (Empreinte Ecosociale®) database, LFR is publishing a series of Blogs showing how selected ESG indicators are defined, what they represent and how they are interpreted. LFR is also ready to engage with interested parties on any aspect of this analysis.