Walmart announced last week that they planned to get rid of 20 million metric tons of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from its suppliers by 2015. According to Walmart, this would be the equivalent of taking 3.8 million cars off the highways for a year
(Walmart Announces Goal to Eliminate 20 Million Metric Tons of Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Global Supply Chain). Walmart has major leverage over its suppliers -- most of their existence depends upon Walmart buying their products. Therefore, when Walmart tells its suppliers to reduce emissions, they will not risk disobedience(Mui, Ylan Q. "Wal-mart promises to lower greenhouse gas emissions by 2015)
The motives for Walmart's current emphasis on going green are probably more politically motivated than based on a moral desire to improve the environment(Walmart Reducing Greenhouse Gases). They have been heavily criticized for damaging local environments by building big block stores with huge hard surface parking lots and face possible action from the US Labor Department. One labor historian, Nelson Lichtenstein, theorizes that Walmart is just trying to get in good with the Obama administration to avoid a possible crackdown on their labor practices (Plumer, Bradford. "The New Republic: How Good is Walmart's Green?") Lichtenstein also worries that Walmart's green initiative may cause suppliers, especially in other countries, to lower pay for employees in order to pay for new green technologies.
Regardless of Walmart's motives, the sheer size of the company has the potential to spur a ripple effect in the corporate world regarding green technologies.
I've also posted a link to Walmart's complete announcement via webcast last month concerning their commitment to reduce emissions:
Greenhouse Gas Emission announcement by Walmart (Video)
It is good that Wal-Mart is trying to reduce emission regardless of their reasons. The possible negative ripple effect concerns me though. There are other ways that Wal-Mart could go green that I think maybe they should look into. Maybe building stores to LEED standards, adding trees and grassy dividers in parking lots, or being one of the first big chains to implement a permeable pavement system. Other countries even charge a small fee to use plastic bags to discourage their use, something maybe stores in this country should consider. The economy is not doing so well right now and lots of people are out of jobs. When I hear that wages for workers in foreign countries may decrease, I think about all the people in this country without jobs. Since Wal-Mart apparently has all this influence maybe they should use it to try and get manufacturers so come back to the United States, so the people buying their products can have jobs and actually afford them.
ReplyDeleteI think that wal mart is doing the right thing by trying to lower their emission standards. It doesnt matter to me wheather they are doing it for moral reasons or political the fact that they are doing it is the important part. If they want to really help out their emissions they could stop using foreign labor to make their goods that they sell. These foreign made goods have to travel great distances to get to the stores and use a tremendous amount of fuel to get there. If they are mad in America they dont have to be shipped nearly as far. Also they would be giving jobs back to Americans who have had their jobs taken by foreign labor. This would help boost our dwindling economy.
ReplyDeleteI think Wal Mart is making a responsible decision by lowering emission standards regardless of whether it was moral or political reasoning. They are such a large corporation, I think it is important that they are taking initiative because this lays the foundation for other corporations to follow the same path. To address the issue of parking lots, I agree with the blog posts above on the ideas of permeable pavement and tree plantation. Also a fee for plastic bags is a good way to encourage reusable bags. I also agree with the statement about foreign labor. I think less foreign labor could lead to many improvements in our country.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the comments above about it being good that Walmart is working to reduce the its GHG emissions. I also agree that action should be taken against the problems caused by parking lots.
ReplyDeleteAccording to the blog it seems that Walmart is only interested in reducing the emissions of its suppliers not the actual stores. If Walmart worked to make its stores and practices more environmentally friendly, it would have a tremendous effect.
The problem with Walmart giving jobs back to Americans is that its not competitive because of the significant wage differences in America versus the places where walmart is hiring foreign labor. Because of this it is unlikely that Walmart would choose to do so. Any kind of government policies would also be a poor idea on the grounds that they are protectionist and would stifle innovation in the markets. While it is important to protect American jobs we should try harder to create new ones by investing in and expanding new sectors (like green energy) as the labor in other sectors and taken overseas. Just a thought.