What Do Companies Think About When Reading Aftonbladet’s News on Max Burgers?

Recently, people have been asking us for our thoughts on Aftonbladet’s recent articles criticizing Max Burgers’ climate efforts.

Aftonbladet reported that Max Burgers, a fast-food chain, had partnered on a tree-planting carbon offset project in Uganda. However, their investigation raised concerns about the project’s results. In response, Max announced plans to launch their own independent review of the initiative (you can read Aftonbladet’s article here).

This brings up a big question: Is carbon offset a good approach to fight climate change, or does it give unwanted risks being labelled as greenwashing?

What is considered a good approach?

The WWF outlines a clear hierarchy for tackling emissions. They listed them in order of how effective they are:

1. Avoid emissions first. For instance, encourage biking/ walking instead of driving
2. Reduce emissions. For instance, improve energy efficiency to lower the emission.
3. Substitute by switching to renewable energy. For instance, invest in renewable energy or switching the energy provider to a 100% renewable source.
4. Offset as the final step after all of the above are explored.

How can companies avoid unwanted greenwashing risks?

The WWF highlights some key points:

1. Focus on your value chain. Companies’ climate action should primarily focus on in-value-chain emission reductions and transforming sectors and markets. This is where companies have the greatest incentive to act and most influence to drive deep decarbonization and systemic market transformation across sectors and regions.
2. Using carbon credits from outside company value chains to meet climate targets (except for residual emissions) is not recommended. This is because it will redirect efforts away from the investments and innovations needed for driving systemic change and deep decarbonization in companies’ value chains.
3. Invest responsibly. To drive additional finance to the Global South and nature, it’s helpful to grow a high quality and credible voluntary carbon market for companies to make additional investments beyond their value chain and to neutralize any residual emissions. Companies can invest in neutralizing residual emissions today through greenhouse gas removals as long as it doesn’t substitute action on in-value-chain emission reductions (a good example in this topic is IKEA).

What should companies do?

To be credible and effective, companies need to:

1. demonstrate that their climate commitment is in line with the Paris Agreement
2. measure and disclose their emission across all scopes publicly
3. develop a credible net-zero decarbonization pathway including both climate targets and concrete action plans.
4. follow the hierarchy of emission reduction (and not just rely on offsetting)
5. monitor and disclose their decarbonization progress every year

Why it’s worth the effort

Taking these steps not only protects companies from greenwashing accusations but also brings business benefits:

• Improved energy efficiency.
• Stronger customer and employee loyalty.
• Enhanced eligibility and appeal to investors who value sustainability.
• Leadership in building a more sustainable business future.

By following these principles, companies can turn climate change risks into long-lasting competitive advantage and make a genuine difference in building a sustainable business.