Biodiversity reporting in the fast-food industry

Publication date: 29/01/2024
Extent: pages

Contributions by: Dusan Ecim and Warren Maroun, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa

Chapter synopsis:

The fast-food industry has a significant impact on global biodiversity. The industry members are well placed to address these impacts through initiatives encouraging no-net-loss/net-gain biodiversity policies. A review of prior academic research identifies the key challenges faced by the fast-food industry to develop a simple checklist to evaluate biodiversity reporting. The checklist is applied to three global industry members: McDonald’s, Yum!, and Restaurant Brands International. Findings show that although this industry has developed initiatives to combat biodiversity loss, these predominantly focus on no-net-loss positions. Biodiversity reporting also has concerns including a lack of integration of biodiversity-related metrics with performance incentives, underdeveloped management control systems, weaknesses in governance structures, and limited use of combined assurance models and defined frameworks. These deficiencies present an opportunity for industry members to leverage an integrated thinking mindset and multi-capital approach to biodiversity reporting.

DOI: 10.19103/AS.2023.0128.22