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McDonald's Corporation released its 2011 Sustainability Scorecard and reinforced its commitment to mainstreaming sustainability for customers through the company's actions and collaboration with suppliers, experts, and the food industry as a whole.
The 2011 Scorecard highlights the company's progress in five priority areas, including significant advancements related to menu evolution and sustainable sourcing. For example:
· By the end of March 2012, fruit will automatically be included in every Happy Meal served in U.S. and Latin America restaurants. Additional changes, including a new smaller size of French Fries only available in Happy Meals, will result in reductions in calories and fat for the most popular Happy Meals.
· More than 95 percent of McDonald's restaurants around the world offer Happy Meals with sides of fruit, vegetables, or low-fat dairy as an option.
· As part of the Sustainable Land Management Commitment, which outlines the company's commitment to sourcing all of its food and packaging from sustainable sources over time, McDonald's has made measurable progress in its five initial focus areas of beef, poultry, coffee, palm oil, and fiber.
· All fish for McDonald's Filet-O-Fish sandwich is wild caught, and currently 99 percent is sourced from Marine Stewardship Council (MSC)-certified fisheries.
These actions are aligned with the company's focus on leveraging its brand recognition and core competencies as a food company to influence wide-reaching and sustainable change.
"We will continue to use our size, scope, and talent to make a positive difference for children, families, and communities around the world," says Jim Skinner, McDonald's CEO. "Doing so creates value for both our company and our stakeholders."
In addition to food and food sourcing, McDonald's continues to focus on, and achieve measurable progress in, three other areas central to its sustainability strategy: Environmental Responsibility, Employee Experience, and Community.
In 2011, McDonald's developed stronger energy-related metrics, with a focus on company-owned restaurants. McDonald's top nine major markets made significant improvements in energy data gathering and reporting capabilities.
The company made available for purchase more than 90 pieces of more energy-efficient equipment to the McDonald's system, as well as introduced "energy bundles"—packages of recommended restaurant improvements that combine simple changes like energy-efficient lighting with newer tools such as occupancy sensors.
Across all markets, these reduction efforts are enabling our restaurant energy use to remain steady, despite increases in restaurant hours, equipment, and menu items.
McDonald's continues to focus on developing its people through a wide array of education, job training, and life skills opportunities. For example, in the U.S., the average restaurant manager completes the equivalent of approximately 21 credit hours—one semester of college—that can be transferred to many public and private schools and applied toward a two- or four-year degree. Similarly, 96 percent of company-operated restaurants have a restaurant manager who has trained at the company's world-class learning center, Hamburger University.
The company's long-standing leadership stance in the area of diversity and inclusion continues to be a competitive strength. For example, more than 50 percent of company-operated restaurant managers and nearly 30 percent of the worldwide top management team are women.
For almost 40 years, Ronald McDonald House Charities (RMHC) has been the charity of choice for McDonald's. Since 2002, countries around the world have raised nearly $170 million during McHappy Day/Give a Hand events, which benefit RMHC and other children's causes.
In 2010, participating restaurants in the U.S. began making a contribution from the sale of each Happy Meal and Mighty Kids Meal. In 2011, RMHC Donation Boxes in the U.S. are projected to reach more than $27 million in customer contributions.
Looking toward 2012, McDonald's will continue to advance goals and targets for mainstreaming sustainability in all five focus areas and reporting progress along the global journey.
"We will continue to mainstream sustainability into our day-to-day business, bring value to the communities we serve, and value to our company through efficiencies, innovations and consumer relevance," says Bob Langert, McDonald's global vice president of Sustainability.
