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According to the Carbon Trust, sales of products that have carbon-friendly labels are on the rise.
The regulatory body, which grants accreditation under the scheme, said that nine of 10 UK householders were purchasing carbon-labelled products over the past 12 months. They also said that sales on goods that set off carbon footprints have passed £2bn a year.
Since its inception in 2007, the scheme has gathered nearly 5,000 products represented by 90 different brands. Goods range from pasta to shampoo. In the past critics have questioned the value of such schemes as influencing peoples’ purchasing behaviours.
However, according to recent information from the Centre for Retail Research, the Carbon Reduction Label reached its £2bn-per-year sales mark after popular grocer Tesco added its own-label pasta to the scheme. Euan Murray, the Carbon Trust’s head of footprinting said that the label is a means for shoppers to understand the environmental impacts of the brands they are purchasing.
According to the Trust, each step of a product’s life cycle is taken into account when factoring in the carbon label. Furthermore, carbon label products also must commit to reducing emissions even more over a two-year period. Those firms that do not reduce emissions could be see their labels withdrawn.
Critics, however, maintain that carbon labeling programmes merely penalise products suppliers, most of which are from developing nations and fail to offer any impacting information to consumers.
Yet, the Trust continues to forge ahead adding products to its labeling scheme each year. Currently, it is working with Sainsbury’s Dairy Development Group – comprised of over 320 dairy farms – supplying carbon-friendly milk to local supermarkets.