Toyota Makes No Progress in Planning for Fossil-Free Supply Chain
Second Auto Supply Chain Leaderboard finds that Toyota is the only company not to improve its score on building fossil-free supply chains
WASHINGTON, D.C. – As American automakers make progress toward improving the impacts of their supply chains on climate change and on human rights, Toyota continues to stagnate. It is the only automaker to make no improvements in its supply chains to protect the environment or climate, and it only improved by one percentage point on efforts to protect human rights, according to a new scorecard from Lead the Charge.
The second annual Auto Supply Chain Leaderboard found that Toyota had made no progress over the past year in adopting policies to prevent supply chain harms to the climate and environment or in protecting its workforces and the communities that surround the factories making up its network of suppliers.
“For Toyota to let a year pass without making any moves to clean up its supply chain or improve human rights protections for its suppliers is catastrophic,” said Erika Thi Patterson, auto supply chain campaign director with Public Citizen’s climate program. “It is shocking that a global auto giant could be so resistant to committing to any progress in cleaning up its supply chain or protecting workers.”
Out of 18 global automakers, Toyota ranked 14th in the annual scorecard that ranks companies on their overall supply chain.
“Toyota hasn’t set science-based emissions reduction targets for its steel and aluminum supply chains, nor has it considered the risks its supply chain poses to Indigenous rights,” said Thi Patterson. “A company that sees itself as an industry leader is blatantly ignoring the impact its suppliers have on the climate and environment. To stubbornly refuse to join other automakers in making even modest steps toward more protections for the climate, environment, and workers has landed Toyota at the bottom of the industry.”
Among the findings of the scorecard:
- Toyota earned 0 points for efforts to decarbonize its steel and aluminum supply chains, for a variety of factors, including that it hasn’t set science-based emissions reduction targets.
- On human rights protections, Toyota scored zero points under the Indigenous rights category and a mere 8 out of 100 points in the workers’ rights category.
- The company doesn’t disclose the current percent of its suppliers that are providing science-based targets to reduce emissions.
The Leaderboard analyzes publicly available reporting from 18 of the leading automotive manufacturers in the world. It ranks their efforts to eliminate emissions, environmental harms, and human rights violations from their supply chains.
While American automakers improved, no company scored over 50% in the annual Auto Supply Chain Leaderboard, leaving major gaps in how the industry thinks about its supply chain.
These findings come at a crucial time, as leading industry experts call for automakers to disclose and tackle their supply chain emissions as part of their climate strategies. It is now clear that automakers won’t meet their climate goals unless supply chain emissions are also addressed with urgency.
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