In June 2020 Ethical Consumer searched Oxfam's 2019 annual report for details of its environmental reporting.
This stated: "In 2014, we set an absolute carbon reduction target of 30% (from our 2011/12 baseline) for our building energy in shops and our transport logistics to be achieved by 2020... As at 2018/19 we have reduced carbon emissions by 35 per cent... this is mainly due to the increase in renewable energy in the national grid. A new carbon reporting framework will be introduced UK-wide over the next financial year and we will align our reporting to this."
"Although our electricity contract is for 100 per cent renewable energy, our emissions reported here use the standard UK Government GHG conversion factors as the default approach."
It also stated its had an environmental strategy for its shops which included waste management, processing of textiles, packaging and products, and mentioned targets to reduce its carbon footprint across building energy use and Trading logistics, that it would set after an ESOS report that was due in Autumn (2019), and would report on bimonthly via an internal governance group.
Its Ethical and Environmental Policy (2016) applied to suppliers and stated that they were expected to demonstrate commitment to meet standards which included standards on: climate change, waste, materials, packaging, wood and forest products, energy, transport, conservation of biodiversity and water.
Oxfam was considered to have demonstrated a reasonable understanding of its environmental impacts and mentioned environmental targets but was not reporting on them publicly. The reporting figures did not appear to be independently verified. Oxfam received Ethical Consumer's worst rating for environmental reporting.
Reference:
https://www.oxfam.org.uk (1 June 2020)