Our sustainability pledge

Our sustainability pledge is to create authentic shared value for stakeholders through the following outcomes:

  • Contribution to societal change
  • Contribution to responsible living
  • Opportunity creation
  • Resource stewardship

Who are our stakeholders?

Our stakeholders are individuals or groups who interact with SPAR throughout the course of our business. Our material relationships are with suppliers, employees, retailers, consumers and communities.

Identifying, understanding and responding to the needs of our stakeholders have been a core part of our business since SPAR was established in South Africa in 1963. Our core relationships remain stable, but we recognise that other relationships can become more or less important depending on new issues or opportunities that arise.

How do we manage these relationships?

Stakeholder relationships, especially with retailers, are entrenched in the voluntary trading model. We need these relationships for the business to function. Our relationships with stakeholders are informed and shaped by good corporate citizenship practices, including, for example, the reporting requirements of the International Integrated Reporting Council’s <IR> Framework and the King Report on Corporate Governance™ for South Africa, 2016 (copyright and trademarks are owned by the Institute of Directors in South Africa NPC and all of its rights are reserved).

An overview of our stakeholder network

The Social and Ethics Committee has oversight of stakeholder engagement and monitors a stakeholder-inclusive model throughout SPAR.

The new South African supermarket strategy, for example, creates stakeholder value by ensuring that:

  • SPAR stakeholders benefit from being part of the SPAR family;
  • the interests of stakeholders are well balanced for the entire system to be sustainable; and
  • value refers to the broad range of benefits that SPAR delivers to stakeholders (including financial returns, and empowerment opportunities, among others).