Read our Sustainability Report 2023
With every year that passes, we see climate change impacting the way we live, particularly how we produce food. The summer heatwave in 2022 caused significant failures of fruit and veg crops. In 2023, April's temperatures were up to 20°C higher than usually seen across southern Europe and north Africa, significantly affecting cropping, and the UK had its wettest July on record, seriously affecting crops like oil seed rape, potatoes, and wheat.
Riverford remains dedicated to positive change, especially through building the resilience of our own farms and farms in our supply chain. Read our full report to find out about more about how we're reducing emissions, building resilience on farms, and improving nature in the landscape.
Organic farming is kinder to the planet
The principle behind organic farming is that we should learn from and farm in sympathy with nature, rather than suppressing and dominating it. Organic management:
- Protects natural resources, such as fresh water and healthy soils
- Encourages wildlife; there is up to 50% more wildlife on organic farms
- Avoids pollution from artificial chemicals (we use no artificial pesticides or fertilisers).
- Uses less energy per kg of food produced
- Captures CO2 emissions in the soil through 'carbon sequestration'
Learn more about organic farming
Agroforestry & tree planting
Trees are an important part of our plans to sequester carbon, protect our soil, and pioneer perennial crop farming in Devon.
In early 2022, 1,588 trees were planted across four farms through our Refer a Friend Scheme, with a focus on nut trees such as walnuts, hazelnuts, and chestnuts.
Riverford plans to continue supporting agroforestry throughout our supply chain, expanding beyond nut trees. This commitment aligns with our broader vision of sustainable agriculture and environmental stewardship.
How many trees have we planted into agroforestry systems so far?
- Winter 2021 - 1,600 trees planted
- Winter 2022 - 5,000 trees planted
- Winter 2023 - 10,000 trees planned
These systems are expected to sequester thousands of tonnes of carbon over their lifetimes.
Making our packaging sustainable
Some packaging is a necessary evil. It protects our food, thereby preventing food waste. We can't do without it entirely, but we have done rigorous research to find the most sustainable solutions.
Our packaging promise:
- Our fruit and veg packaging is paper or home compostable, where packaging is needed at all. 30 tonnes of plastic is saved every year with our home compostable packaging. That's around the same weight as four tractors!
- Remove, Reduce, Reuse, Recycle is our mission.
- We think long term, balancing the three issues of climate change, marine and land pollution, and food waste
Celebrating UK produce
Across the year, around 70% of our veg is UK grown. 100% of our meat is British.
Sourcing from small-scale organic growers and makers, predominantly from the UK, is really important to our impact on the environment and local economic development. We're committed to sourcing as much as possible from independent UK producers.
We do our best to inform and enthuse about what's in season, and to provide the widest range our climate will allow. We extend seasons using polytunnels that don't use artificial heat or light, and campaign for little-eaten British veg like cardoons and kohlrabi. For those committed to a truly homegrown, seasonal diet, we offer our 100% UK veg box.
Local isn't always best!
In an ideal world, we would all eat with our local season. In the real world, however: bananas, citrus, a 12-month supply of tomatoes, peppers and apples… These things can't be grown naturally in the UK, but have come to be viewed as non-negotiable essentials in most households. Given this reality, we've done a lot of research to allow us to make intelligent compromises.
There are two options: growing out-of-season produce at home using artificial heat (generated by burning gas or oil), or importation. In the Riverford Sustainable Development Project, Exeter University concluded that importation by road is by far the greener choice.
Take the example of tomatoes. For every kilo of tomatoes grown in a UK hothouse, 2-3 kilos of C0
No air freight
We never use air freight, which causes 40-50 times the C0
The HGV industry has become very efficient: it is now common practice to buy high spec, high capacity trucks, and backload them so they rarely travel empty. Trucking of imports only accounts for 6% of our total carbon footprint; for comparison, our cardboard veg boxes account for 10%.
Delivering even greener veg
We're swapping diesel vans to electric vehicles wherever range permits it (some of our more rural routes are too long for the range of electric vehicles at the moment). Van for van, this change will reduce emissions by up to 70%.
We've electrified 30% of our van fleet, and all our delivery vans will be 100% electric by 2025.
Here's what else we do to make sure your delivery is as green as possible:
- Organising routes to minimise distances. We carefully plan our weekly routes to minimise the distance travelled per drop. That's why you have a fixed delivery day! We may be less flexible than supermarkets which let you choose a delivery time, but our deliveries are many times more efficient.
- Fuel efficient vans and drivers. Until we go 100% electric, our vans are Euro 6 compliant (the cleanest diesel vehicles on the road), and use AdBlue, a urea solution added to fuel to further reduce emissions. Our drivers are sent on government-backed SAFE Driver course. This not only improves their safety, but also their efficiency; some show a reduction in fuel use of 10%.
- Home deliveries are more efficient than going shopping in your own car. As a general point, most studies show that the final step, to customers' doors, is the most energy-consuming stage of food's journey; although distances are short, loads tend to be small. Exeter University found that because home delivery consolidates many people's shopping journeys into one, it's usually more efficient than going shopping in your own car.
Fighting food waste
Research suggests that reducing food waste would be the third most effective solution to fighting climate change. So where do we start to address the problem? At the start of the supply chain: on the farm. In the UK, an estimated 2.5 million tonnes of food are wasted on farms every year.
Selling directly to customers means that we can meticulously plan our boxes' contents a year or more in advance. We grow the amount we expect to need, and that's it. Few retailers agree, but we think it's better to occasionally run out than to routinely overproduce.
We also have wider and more forgiving specs for fruit and veg than supermarkets. Wonky veg is welcome in our boxes; we grow for flavour, not cosmetic perfection. On occasions when something simply can't go out to customers (if it's too ripe, or damaged) our grade-out system finds a good home for it…
- Charity donations. We've partnered with over ten different charities who distribute surplus fruit and veg. Find out more on our Charity Partnerships hub.
- Our staff canteens and restaurant. Lots of our grade-out fruit and veg is used in the canteens on our farms, and also made into inspiring menus at The Riverford Field Kitchen.
- Free veg for staff! Our staff eat well. Not only do they get subsidised meals at work, but they get free fruit and veg to take home too.
- The Riverford Dairy herd. Cows love veg! Who knew? Their favourite is broccoli, but they aren't so keen on oranges. We can't give them everything though; beetroot makes their milk pink. In total, we divert over 900 tonnes of root veg a year to livestock feed.
Biodiversity action
The UK's biodiversity is in decline - and in recent years, the single biggest cause has been the intensification of agriculture. Organic is better for wildlife, with up to 30% more biodiversity on organic compared to conventionally farmed land. But this year, we've also set out a specific Biodiversity Action Plan to encourage nature on our farms.
Here's what's been happening at Wash Farm this year:
- Planted over 460 meters of hedging, and this winter, we plan to plant an additional 400 metres.
- New pond creation which is already proving to be a popular habitat for various species, including dragonflies, damselflies, swallows, and house martins.
We've also created a Biodiversity Action Plan for Riverford on Sacrewell Farm, Peterborough. We will start to implement this plan in 2024.
Growing with green power
Since 2007, we've bought green electricity from Ecotricity; mostly generated by sun and wind, and currently supplied through the National Grid. Ecotricity's calculations show that with their help, we've prevented around 665 tonnes of C02 emissions in the last year alone. It would take nearly 321,000 trees to absorb that much carbon in the same time.
That's brilliant - but we would rather someone else bought that green electricity, and we generated our own. We hope that within ten years, with the advance of battery technology, we will be able to generate most of our own power from on-farm wind turbines and solar panels. It will be a challenge - but watch this space.
