Go Beyond – Take the Meat Off the Table

Written by: Briana Corcoran, Brooke Leeder, Drew Cutright, Myung Ki (Matthew) Min, Stephanie Kinsey

Gone are the days of bland meat substitutes. Beyond Meat’s plant-based meat substitutes, which boast a lighter carbon footprint than meat, are both delicious and healthy. They create a variety of plant-based, meat alternative products including burgers, ground meat, breakfast patties, sausages, chicken nuggets, chicken tenders, meatballs, and jerky.  Their brand promise is “Eat What You Love,” and they believe that small changes can have a big impact on both our personal health and the planet. By shifting from animal protein to plant-based protein, Beyond Meat focuses on improving four global problems: human health, climate change, constraints on natural resources, and animal welfare. Their products are available for purchase in grocery stores, online, and at restaurants nationwide.

Beyond Meat actively addresses the impact that meat has on the environment while looking to future-proof itself against climate change. Drought, flooding, wildfires, or other natural disasters could destroy crops and cause supply limitations for the company’s ingredients, which could increase the cost of products or limit production. Rising temperatures might limit the time people can work outdoors and impact how crops are harvested. In addition, their buildings, distribution centers, and inventory could be at risk due to extreme weather events.

Much of their climate change risk is within their supply chain (Scope 3). As they continue to expand and partner with numerous retailers and food chains to sell their products, their supply chain will become increasingly complex. They must work with their supply partners to measure and reduce GHG emissions.

Since Beyond Meat positions itself as a purpose-driven business founded in direct response to the effects of livestock-related emissions, the company’s environmental opportunities are presented in comparison to traditional meat alternatives. Buying Beyond Meat products can help consumers limit their contribution to GHG emissions by lowering demand for meat products, which are produced with approximately 90% more GHG emissions, 37% more non-renewable energy, 97% more land use, and with 97% more water.

In 2020, Beyond Meat commissioned an ESG materiality assessment to identify the potential areas of climate-related impact and gauge the risk of impact on business operations. Beyond Meat chose a few key areas to prevent future impacts to business and alleviate stakeholder concern, including developing more sustainable packaging by reducing package size, optimizing packing space and packaging operations, reducing water use by implementing “dry cleaning” procedures, and increasing recycling efforts to reduce landfill waste.

In addition, Beyond Meat focuses on sustainably sourcing components that have a smaller environmental impact than meat production. This includes employing plant-based proteins, which use less water and land than animal agriculture to lower its carbon footprint.

The corporation invests in R&D to innovate and improve its products. Beyond Meat strives to improve the taste, texture, and nutritional profile of its plant-based meat substitutes, making them more appealing to customers and retaining market competitiveness. By increasing the demand for plant-based products, higher emission products are effectively substituted with lower-emission alternatives.

Although Beyond Meat appears to have a clear company focus on reducing climate impacts, the company is still in the early stages of reporting carbon data and quantifying Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions. Beyond Meat uses industry-specific topics and metrics from the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) in categories of “energy management, water management, food safety, health and nutrition, product labeling and marketing, packaging life cycle management, environment and social impacts of ingredient supply chains, and ingredient sourcing.” Since the company started gathering environmental data in 2020 and 2021, full Scope 1 and 2 emissions have not been reported. Beyond Meat calculated baseline GHG emissions and notes that an updated assessment offering a comprehensive evaluation of Scope 1 and 2 emissions is in development to influence strategy. This strategy will include recommendations from their Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD).  

As of November 2023, Beyond Meat was independently rated by Sustainalytics with an ESG Risk Rating of 40.3, Severe Risk, exposure risk is High, and management of material risk is Average. Specific factors used in determining the risk score were unavailable. Despite this, Beyond Meat has developed a report that outlines initiatives related to social impact (including inclusive products, food safety production, and community partnerships), employee engagement, and DEI strategy. Beyond Meat works with a variety of stakeholders, including legislators, industry groups, and environmental organizations, to advocate for policies and programs that support sustainable food systems.

As Beyond Meat strengthens their climate strategy, they should consider utilizing the GHG Protocol to measure emissions and setting science-based targets with third party verification. In addition to benchmarking themselves against meat products, they should benchmark themselves against competitors in the meat substitute industry, such as Morning Star or Impossible Foods; striving to be not only better than meat, but the best in their field.

Other changes to consider are in both their packaging and real estate strategy. They may wish to pursue compostable packaging, particularly in markets with municipal composting – or pursue innovative packaging technology research (such as water-soluble packaging). As their real estate expands, they should consider only renovating existing building facilities to LEED O+M or greater standards, rather than building new facilities. Living Building (regenerative) strategies may not be possible for manufacturing facilities for on-site renewable energy production, storage, and usage, but components such as on-site water treatment and use of salvaged materials should be considered. Additionally, the location of their production facilities should focus on their primary markets and proximity to primary suppliers to reduce emissions from the transit of materials to production and of products to market.

Beyond Meat’s strategies for mitigating climate change and reducing their impact are carefully considered and often innovative, yet they have work to do. They are a young company and recognize that future strategy must be informed by tracking their Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions and setting science-based targets accordingly. If Beyond Meat can sharpen focus by measuring and tracking these targets, they will continue to be a leader in the meat substitute industry.

References

2022 ESG Report: https://investors.beyondmeat.com/static-files/38b491e1-f1d6-47d2-b65c-359df79fbb10

July 2022 ESG update: https://investors.beyondmeat.com/static-files/6fcd4169-617f-4fe2-9b40-cdfd8de77be3 Beyond Meat: Vegan Meat, Plant Based Meat Substitutes

Beyond Meat Corporate Profile: Investor Relations | Beyond Meat, Inc.

Sustainalytics ESG Risk Rating: https://www.sustainalytics.com/esg-rating/beyond-meat-inc/2003477310