ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT
Adverse environmental impact from Sodexo’s activities: poor management of food waste, ineffective actions to mitigate climate change.
Risk Timeframe: Long-term 
Category: Corporate Responsibility
Impact
- Poor food waste management could result in a loss of client and consumer confidence and a decreased ability to attract new clients.
- Ineffective climate change actions could result in Sodexo’s carbon emissions staying the same or even increasing.
Examples of Mitigating Activities
- WasteWatch global program to reduce food waste.
- Renewed partnership with WWF in Fiscal 2020 focused on reducing the Company’s environmental impact and achieving its carbon reduction target.
- Connecting financing costs of the Group to action on food waste performance.
- Environmental awareness campaigns – WasteLess week.
- Founder member and participation in the International Food Waste Coalition.
- Local and responsible sourcing.
- Roll-out of plant-based recipes in units using ingredients selected for their lower environmental impact and higher nutritional value.
- Measurement and tracking of carbon footprint of Sodexo’s food purchases.
- Member of the Climate Group’s RE100 initiative with a commitment to switching to 100% renewable electricity by 2025 at directly operated sites.
PANDEMIC RISKS
Risks associated with the uncertainty surrounding the global pandemic
Risk Timeframe: Short/Medium-term
Category: External Risk
Impact
Undoubtedly the uncertainty surrounding this risk has decreased in the last year. The large-scale roll-out of Covid-19 vaccinations has meant that the transmission rate of the virus, the number of serious infections and deaths has decreased significantly. This has led to a staged reduction of government restrictions in many countries. However, the rapid spread of the Delta variant, which is more contagious, and the risk in breakthrough infections in fully vaccinated individuals as well as emerging evidence that vaccine effectiveness reduces after a number of months means that clients and consumers remain cautious.
Clients are re-opening sites, but often on a staged basis, so that employees return to work on a rotation basis where they are in the workplace one or two days a week. Some national governments still have a work at home regulation in place.
It is possible that targeted national or local lockdowns will continue in FY22 as countries continue to manage their virus response.
Any delay in re-opening sites by clients or new closures as a result of a another increase in infection rates would result in less revenue generation on those sites and reduced profitability for Sodexo.
Examples of Mitigating Activities
- Rise with Sodexo: a global multi-activity program for client sites, that includes workspace optimization, safety guidance, disinfection cleaning and employee well-being services.
- Precise and pro-active management of our workforce to adapt to changing environments.
- Rigorous follow-up on the execution of our services with strong contract management including renegotiation of some terms and conditions.
- Continued focus on management of cash and client receivables.
- GET restructuring program to simplify the organization and reduce costs.
- Continued focus on strict control of selling, general and administrative costs.