Oatly AB
We are the world’s original and largest oat drink company.
ID: 364260236434-80
Lobbying Activity
Response to European Climate Law amendment
17 Sept 2025
Please find the feedback of Oatly AB attached.
Read full responseResponse to Towards a Circular, Regenerative and Competitive Bioeconomy
23 Jun 2025
Oatly welcomes the European Commission's initiative to update the Bioeconomy Strategy, especially in light of the current challenges around food resiliency, competitiveness, security, public health, climate, and biodiversity. We believe that plant-based foods have a crucial role to play in greening the bioeconomy while enhancing EU competitiveness and resiliency, for several reasons. 1) Land and resource efficiency: A more plant-centric food system uses significantly less land, water and inputs (e.g., fertilizers, antibiotics, and feed), making this a strategic sector to support in a land- and resource constrained Europe. 2) Economic resiliency and autonomy: A diversified, plant-centric food system buffers the EU from climate and geopolitical shocks. As it reduces the food system environmental footprint, and contributes to an self-reliant EU in proteins and other inputs. 3) Competitiveness and innovation: The plant-based sector drives green-job creation and strengthens Europe's industrial leadership in the green transition. Due to the resource efficiency of plant-based products, EU producers can do more with less, fostering cost-effective innovation in a globally competitive market. Many innovations around circularity and new business models are still to be unlocked, like valorizing waste streams into food and non-food biobased products (e.g. bio-based building materials). To further unlock the potential of the plant-based food sector, the EU Bioeconomy Strategy should address the following: 1) Strenthen the single market for plant-based foods, creating a level playing field and equal opportunities. Barriers such as fragmented rules, unlevel playing field or high investment risk must be addressed. Food companies must be supported around complex regulatory hurdles and insufficient resources. Practical measures could include providing fair and consistent market rules across the EU. Like rethinking subsidies and taxes, including and not limited to the VAT Directive, to equalise taxes across essential food categories which eliminates unfair cost disadvantages for companies and consumers. We urge policymakers to harmonise standards and labelling for plant-based foods, enabling companies to sell across all Member States under clear, uniform rules. Lastly, we ask the commission to alleviate regulatory inconsistencies for example, aligning naming and marketing standards will prevent market fragmentation, promote simplification, and allow plant-based producers to compete on an international level playing field. 2) Public-private investments in the processing capacity and infrastructure across the broader plant-based food value chain, to unlock scale, boost green job creation and recognise the essential role of processors in scaling to new domestic and foreign market. Additionally, promote business model creation around the valorisation of waste streams into new food and feed formulations or other innovative bio-based products, unlocking circular economy opportunities. 3) Unlock more breakthroughs with education, science and innovation. We are still in the early stages of how plant-based foods can revolutionize what we eat. We request the EU to co-contribute to research funding gaps, like improving yields and resiliency of plant-based food crops, research in nutrition and health, and investing in education and skill building of farmers / other workforce, and more. We encourage the EU to create conditions that de-risk and reward innovation: from facilitating food tech innovation and scaling, to speeding up approvals for novel food ingredients (without compromising on the food quality assurance). About Oatly a food tech company: Oatlys mission is to help people eat better and live healthier lives without recklessly taxing the planets resources in the process. Headquartered in Malmö, Sweden, and with a global Science and Innovation center based in Lund, Sweden the Oatly brand is available in more than 30 countries globally.
Read full responseMeeting with Ilaria Flores Martin (Cabinet of Commissioner Jessika Roswall)
16 Jun 2025 · Bioeconomy
Meeting with Sigrid Friis (Member of the European Parliament)
7 Mar 2025 · European Parliament Strasbourg
Meeting with Emma Wiesner (Member of the European Parliament)
7 Feb 2025 · Livsmedelspolitik
Meeting with Tilly Metz (Member of the European Parliament)
16 Jan 2025 · Agriculture
Meeting with Sebastian Everding (Member of the European Parliament)
16 Oct 2024 · Introductory Meeting - Plant-based Milk and Taxes
Meeting with Anja Hazekamp (Member of the European Parliament)
26 Sept 2024 · Meeting
Meeting with Lukas Visek (Cabinet of Vice-President Maroš Šefčovič)
19 Dec 2023 · Sustainable food systems
Response to Environmental claims based on environmental footprint methods
21 Jul 2023
Oatly welcomes the opportunity to contribute to the public consultation on the EU Green Claims Directive. Oatly supports the overall objective to make companies responsible for substantiating claims about the environmental footprint of their products. We recognize the need to establish a regulatory framework to hinder greenwashing, and to facilitate for consumers to make informed choices. Climate claims should be robust and transparent, and based on actions with real climate impact. Providing transparent and specific information is important to avoid green washing and to allow for comparison of products. We believe in and call for mandatory carbon footprint declaration for foods in absolute numbers. Since 2019 we have declared the climate footprint in carbon dioxide equivalents (CO2e) per weight (kg) on our products in EMEA to respond to consumers needs and to promote sustainable production and consumption. We believe it is a consumer's right to know food products emissions, therefore, we think that the climate declaration ought to be mandatory. We believe a mandatory carbon footprint labelling in numbers can speed up the transition, since it becomes an incentive throughout the value chain to improve the numbers. We call for standardized ways of calculation overseen by the state/government to ensure consistent and transparent comparison across all foods. It is difficult for consumers to understand the different scopes of emissions if not regulated. Another reason to focus on carbon footprint is that robust methods exist, such as e.g the IPCC method. Trying to include multiple environmental impacts is too complicated and risks slowing down the process which we simply cannot afford. Aggregating several aspects in a score or labelling scheme risks undermining clarity and transparency and could even be misleading. Also, we would advise against using the Product Environmental Footprint Category Rules (PEFCR) as benchmark values for substantiation of claims as it does not allow for comparison across categories. Offsetting or any kind of carbon compensation should never be a substitute for emission reduction. To ensure transparency and to avoid greenwashing, carbon offsets and compensation should be tracked, declared and communicated separately.
Read full responseMeeting with Margrete Auken (Member of the European Parliament)
25 May 2023 · Various environmental legislation
Meeting with Jakop G. Dalunde (Member of the European Parliament)
22 May 2023 · Sustainability in the food sector
Response to Amendment of the list of products and substances authorised in organic production
21 Nov 2022
Oatlywelcomestheopportunityto submit feedback on the initiative Organic production authorised products & substances (updated list). Under the currently proposed Annex V of the Implementing Regulation (EU) 2021/1165, as from 1st January 2024, only high-acyl gellan gum from organic production will be permitted in organic foodstuffs. Oatly is calling for a deletion of the provision only from organic production in Annex V in Implementing Regulation (EU) 2021/1165, based on the listed technical and regulatory arguments below. If the regulation is not changed to delete the requirement for gellan gum to be from organic production hundreds of products across the EU will disappear from the market as they cannot be reformulated. Technical and regulatory arguments for an extension of the transition period and deletion of the provision only from organic production: Gellan gum is not of agricultural origin: Gellan gum, being a fermentation product, is not a product of agricultural origin and therefore cannot be in scope of the Regulation (EU) 2018/848 and its demands for organic production. Furthermore, it is not possible to source certain key raw materials in organic quality that provide the same functionality, which would be necessary for the fermentation process. It is therefore presently not possible to manufacture gellan gum organically. Gellan gum has unique technological properties: The authorization of gellan gum as a food additive for both, conventional and organic foods use, is due to the fact that this gum has unique technological properties that cannot be achieved by other economic and technological means (Art.6.1.b R. (EU) 1333/2008). Its technological necessity is given notably, among others, for plant-based alternatives to milk and other plant-based products (stabilisation, shelf-life improvement). As there is no technologically suitable replacement for gellan gum today, the requirement for gellan gum to be from organic production will hinder the development of organic plant-based foods. EUs Farm to for Strategy emphasizes both the shift to more plant-based diets and includes targets for organic production. Widespread use in the EU and worldwide, including organic foods: Gellan gum is used in about 70 food categories. According to a search in March 2022 in the Mintel Global New Products database, between 2017 and 2021, gellan gum was used in 8147 reported new food product launches in 32 countries in Europe, of which 25 are EU member states. Thus, on average there were more than 1625 new food product launches in Europe containing gellan gum as a food additive. Of these more than 1625 total annual new food product launches with gellan gum, 7.5% were organic food products. In relation to the widespread use of gellan gum, it should also be mentioned that conventionally produced gellan gum is authorized in numerous jurisdictions worldwide for use in organic foods. Unilateral measures of the EU which would not be in line with international regulations in other regions of the world, may result in barriers to trade. About Oatly Oatly is a leading brand of oat-based drinks and other products, which are primarily used by consumers as alternatives to milk and dairy products. We are the worlds original and largest oat drink company. For over 25 years, we have exclusively focused on developing expertise around oats: a global power crop with inherent properties suited for sustainability and human health. Headquartered in Malmö, Sweden, the Oatly brand is available in more than 20 countries globally. For more information, please visit www.oatly.com
Read full responseMeeting with Anja Hazekamp (Member of the European Parliament, Shadow rapporteur)
23 Jun 2022 · school schemes & plant based milk
20 Nov 2021
Oatly welcomes the opportunity to submit feedback on the draft act for the School fruit, vegetables & milk scheme – educational measures and the selection/approval of aid applicants (updates).
It is the position of Oatly that plant-based alternatives to traditional cow’s milk should be included in the scope of eligible products of the EU school milk scheme for a number of reasons, which we will list below. Correspondingly, we believe it is important that the rules for the accompanying educational measures are updated and cover information on plant-based options to promote sustainable diets and food systems. Nutritious fortified plant-based alternatives to traditional cow's milk and milk products have existed for many years. A report published by Imperial College London in October 2019 points out: “Plant-based meat and dairy replacements or analogues have an important role to play in shifting to sustainable diets as they reduce the complexity of plant-based eating and are highly compatible with existing food habits (both associated with rapid innovation adoption).” It is essential for young people to encounter a range of tastes, including of plant-based foods, to ensure that they develop a full range of taste preferences as their palate develops. Children should, accordingly, be taught and offered sustainable and nutritious plant-based alternatives to traditional animal-based dairy in schools.
The education system should bring new and different perspectives, teach children critical thinking and knowledge based on scientific facts.
Oatly strongly recommends including plant-based nutritious alternatives to traditional cow’s milk in the EU school scheme, both in the scope of eligible products and in the educational measures on the following grounds:
- Making the transition to sustainable food systems. The food sector is a critically important climate driver. We cannot solve climate change without transforming the food system. One third of the global greenhouse gas emissions come from the food system. About half of those emissions come from meat and dairy. In the EU, agriculture is responsible for 10.3 % of the EU’s greenhouse gas emissions and nearly 70 % of those come from the animal sector. Shifting to a plant-rich diet, including plant-based options to dairy, presents an important opportunity for people to cut their climate footprint and adapt to a changing world, while providing significant health co-benefits. Scientists estimate, by 2050, shifting to low GHG diets could free several million square km of land from food production and mitigate climate change up to 0.7 to 8.0 Gigatons of CO2e per year, relative to business-as-usual projections.
- Promoting plant-based diets and sustainable and healthy eating habits and lifestyles. In this context, it is important that the EU school scheme supports more plant-based diets by including plant-based alternatives to traditional animal-based dairy products. The educational measures should focus on creating behavior change and encourage children to make well informed and conscious choices of foods with regard to health and climate change. This is also a way of empowering and providing young people with knowledge and tools to tackle climate anxiety.
- Ensuring inclusion and fair treatment of children who cannot or don’t want to consume cow’s milk due to milk protein allergy or lactose intolerance, or due to environmental, health, ethical or religious reasons.
- Ensuring level playing field for cow’s milk and plant-based options in schools. The educational material is promoting an increased intake of dairy products to ensure a long-term production of those agricultural products. The present school milk scheme and educational measures constitute an unfair regulatory barrier. Oatly maintains that the promotion of milk and dairy in schools distorts the market and discriminates the growing plant-based drink sector.
Read full responseResponse to Review of the EU school fruit, vegetables and milk scheme - EU aid
27 Jul 2021
Oatly welcomes the opportunity to submit feedback to the Commission's review of the EU school fruit, vegetables and milk scheme.
Oatly also welcomes the fact that this review will contribute to promoting sustainable food consumption, in line with the Farm to Fork Strategy and the Green Deal.
According to the preamble of the Regulation, the purpose of the scheme is to give children the opportunity to drink and eat more of these foods and to permanently increase the proportion of these products in children's diet at the age when their eating habits are established. The purpose of the EU School Milk Scheme is to promote consumption of traditional animal-based dairy among school children to stimulate market demand.
For the EU to take global leadership and spearhead the fight against climate change and to achieve its long-term commitment to decarbonize its economy it must facilitate a shift to plant-based production and consumption. Oatly believes it is essential that the EU school scheme promotes sustainable and healthy eating habits among children. Including plant-based foods, such as fortified plant-based drinks, in the EU School Scheme is an important tool in promoting sustainable plant-based diets. Moreover, including plant-based drinks would recognize the needs among children who cannot or does not want to drink traditional cows’ milk. It is important to remove structural hurdles hindering the shift to plant-based diets.
It is the position of Oatly that plant-based drinks should be included in the scope of eligible products on the following five grounds:
1. Making the transition to sustainable food systems
2. Promoting health and nutrition
3. Guaranteeing socio-economic fairness
4. Promoting sustainable and plant-based diets
5. Ensuring a level playing field
The attachment addresses each of these five grounds.
Read full responseResponse to Education for environmental sustainability
11 May 2021
Oatly welcomes the opportunity to submit feedback on the proposal for a council recommendation on education for environmental sustainability. We are pleased to see that the European Green Deal highlights the key role of education and training in engaging with learners, educators, parents and the wider community on the environmental challenges facing the planet. The educational system is an appropriate platform since it includes all children from an early age. Climate change and sustainability is among the top concerns among young people. To lead a sustainable lifestyle implies in most cases behavior change, requiring an individual to move from concern for the environment towards taking action.
By integrating sustainability in the curriculum the education system can help empowering people with knowledge and tools to help them make informed choices and tackle those concerns.
We believe that The European Green Deal, which sets out how to make Europe the first climate-neutral continent by 2050, should be the starting point. Education is key to reach the EU's increased climate goals – from 40% emission reduction to 55% net reduction by 2030.
We also believe that education efforts should focus on the areas that contribute the most to the emission of greenhouse gases, as well as on the areas which individuals can influence, in order to empower and build commitment to behavioral change among people. Food production, and food consumption in particular, is such an area. The Farm to Fork Strategy, which is the heart of The Green Deal, highlights that the transition towards a sustainable and healthy food system will not take place without a change in people's dietary habits. Information and education is a pre-condition for this to happen.
After reviewing the proposal, we recommend three changes or additions:
1. Further define the term environmental sustainability
2. Include in the subject matter the impact of the food system on climate change and the link between sustainability and healthy eating habits
3. Include school meals as a focus area in education on sustainable, healthy food systems
Read full responseResponse to Agriculture - List of products and substances authorised in organic production
23 Apr 2021
Oatly welcomes the opportunity to submit feedback to the updated list of products and substances authorized in organic production. As stated in the initiative, we agree that it is important that the EU rules on organic farming are designed to provide a clear structure for producing organic goods across the EU. The rules should provide a fair marketplace for producers, distributors and marketers. Equally important is that the rules meet consumers’ demand for organic products of high quality.
Today, there is an accelerating demand for plant-based foods among consumers who want to make sustainable food choices. The consumers often demand products that are both plant-based and organic. The need to enable EU organic certification of these products is key to facilitate a shift towards a more sustainable food system in line with the objectives of the Farm to Fork-strategy.
We strongly believe that the present legal framework needs to be clarified and revised from a sustainability and nutritional point of view to strengthen the organic production and make it relevant also to future consumers.
The list of products and substances authorized in organic production mirrors that the organic regulation is fit for animal-based foods (eggs, meat and dairy) and raw vegetables and fruits, not for plant-based options to traditional animal-based products such as dairy products. Given how important plant-based products are as part of a solution in the shift towards a sustainable food-system, it is essential to allow fortification and ingredients which make organic plant-based dairy alternatives attractive and relevant. The legal framework for organic should be aligned with and support the consumer driven shift towards more sustainable plant-based eating. The fact that vitamins and minerals (non-organic) are authorized in products and substances for use as feed or in feed production, but not in organic plant-based foods creates a conflict which is not in consumers interest nor in line with the EU sustainability ambitions. With that inconsistency, we think that the rules could not be said to provide a fair marketplace for producers, distributors and marketers. It is our opinion that the legal framework needs to level the playing-field with the traditional dairy industry when it comes to fortification. It is not reasonable that the dairy industry can fortify milk through the feed of cows, whereas fortified plant-based organic options are not allowed.
Additionally, the current directive does not meet the demand for organic products with high quality.
Public institutions should be able to increase their offer of plant-based nutritionally relevant alternatives to people who cannot or does not want to consume traditional dairy products due to medical, health, sustainability, ethical or other reasons. Canteens will be looking to source both organic and nutritionally relevant products, and the assumption among purchasers will be that the organic version of a plant-based option is the same as the conventional option. This is also directly linked to the revision of School Milk Scheme and a possible inclusion of plant-based products in the scope.
We raise this issue because we want to make it easier for consumers who want to shift to a more sustainable and plant-based diet. It must be easy for consumers to switch, and we believe that organic fortified plant-based foods could play an important role in this shift.
We suggest permitting fortification and ingredients as mentioned in the attached document. Long term the option of introducing a new category of plant-based processed food in the legal framework for organic products could be a possible way forward. We believe it is necessary to review the legal framework and the list of approved ingredients if organic is going to be relevant for the consumers and for the plant-based food sector.
Read full responseResponse to Revision of EU marketing standards for agricultural products
16 Feb 2021
Oatly welcomes the opportunity to contribute to the public consultation on the Inception Impact Assessment (IIA) on the proposal for a revision of the EU Marketing Standards.
Marketing standards help facilitate the functioning of the internal market, keep food of unsatisfactory quality off the market, provide relevant information to consumers, and ensure a level playing field for competing products. We believe it is essential that the legislation on marketing standards reflect the scientific findings and changed consumer behaviors since it was established more than 30 years ago. The legislation should make it easy for consumers to find and switch to new plant- based products, permitting a terminology with familiar points of reference when looking for alternatives to animal-based meat and dairy products. The proposed revision and harmonisation of EU Marketing Standards recognises the need to use such standards to contribute to a more sustainable food system. This means promoting and enabling sustainable food choices, and it certainly means removing restrictions which make it harder to choose healthy, sustainable foods.
Please find our full response, including references in the attached document.
Read full responseResponse to 8th Environment Action Programme
31 Dec 2020
This feedback is submitted on behalf of the Swedish company Oatly (www.oatly.com), which produces and distributes oat-based foodstuffs.
Oatly actively supports the Commission’s proposed Environmental Action Plan and the binding objective of EU climate neutrality by 2050, and welcomes the Commission’s response to the challenges identified in the SOER 2020 by adopting the European Green Deal. As a leading producer and distributor of oat-based foodstuffs, Oatly sees this plan as necessary to drive a faster transition towards a plant-based food system. Animal-based food products result in high greenhouse gas emissions and unsustainable land-use practices, which currently work against the necessary climate ambition.
- The 8th EAP has the long-term priority objective for 2050 that citizens live well, within the planetary boundaries in a regenerative economy where nothing is wasted, no net emissions of greenhouse gases are produced and economic growth is decoupled from resource use and environmental degradation. With this priority in mind, and against this background of the global climate crisis, rising food waste levels and diet-related non-communicable diseases, Oatly wants to highlight the rate at which the market of innovative and sustainable plant-based foodstuffs has been growing in the past years, providing a response to these problems. Looking at food sector-specific European policies, including the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), the need for an environmentally friendly food system in Europe is however yet to be completely reflected in policy.
- As the action plan references, environment and climate policy is an area of shared competence in the EU and a decentralised policy. Oatly welcomes the action plan’s goal to create common ownership of environmental policy, including individual citizens, and notes that consumer demand for sustainably produced and healthy plant-based foodstuffs is increasing at a fast rate. In order to reach the goals of promoting environmental sustainability and reducing key environmental and climate pressures related to production and consumption, the EU needs policies to facilitate the shift towards a more plant-based food system. These policies would be pro-growth and pro-environment and should encourage adaptation across the entire value chain; farming, industry and consumption, while also ensuring that citizens’ needs for nutrition are met in a sustainable way that leaves no-one behind. Current policy frameworks – notably the Common Agriculture Policy - often act as a barrier to the necessary shift towards a plant-based food system. For example, the Common Organisation of the Markets (CMO) provisions currently work against market developments by supporting unsustainable activities such as marketing of milk in schools. Other examples are promotion campaigns encouraging consumption of meat and dairy.
- As noted in the action plan, reaching the 8th EAP’s priority objectives will require mobilising broad support by involving citizens. Oatly has previously stated our desire to introduce a mandatory climate footprint declaration in absolute numbers across all categories of foods, for the following reasons:
• It is a transparent system, and we view the climate declaration as an incentive for the entire sector to decrease its climate impact.
• It would make it easier for consumers to make informed choices.
• We believe that it is a consumer's right to know a food product’s emissions.
• It is essential that all foods across categories should be comparable, as it would be highly misleading to the consumer for products to be comparable only within their category.
Read full responseResponse to Protecting biodiversity: nature restoration targets
2 Dec 2020
Oatly is a Swedish food company offering oat-based dairy alternatives.
We would like to comment on the proposed roadmap with a suggestion for ensuring that the scope includes agricultural land and a change in diets.
The roadmap notes that “Biodiversity underpins healthy and nutritious diets and improves rural livelihoods and agricultural productivity” but it should also be noted that biodiversity largely depends on sustainable agricultural practices and population diets. One of the primary drivers for biodiversity loss is changes in land and water use and management for agriculture and food production; which in turn is driven by a range of factors from market prices and economic development, to policies and population growth (FAO, 2019). Agriculture uses about 43% of all ice- and desert-free land, and about 83% of that agricultural land is used for animal-based food (Poore and Nemecek, 2018).
There is huge potential to reduce land use and therefore biodiversity loss if consumers reduced their consumption of animal-based products. For example if consumers halved their consumption of high greenhouse gas impact animal products and replaced them with vegetable equivalents then land use could be reduced by 67% (Poore and Nemecek, 2018).
Additionally, market drivers, like consumer/producer willingness-to-pay for more sustainably produced food/ingredients, coupled with a higher consumption of crops for food (rather than for feed) can provide further opportunities for enabling more sustainable agricultural practices. This is because, firstly, crops for food receive higher market prices than crops for feed – providing more value to farmers, and, secondly, consumers/producers will be more likely to pay for plant-based foods/ingredients that have been produced by sustainably grown crops, rather than paying for animal products which have been produced by sustainably grown animal feed. This is also because the focus on more ‘sustainable’ animal-products tends to be on animal welfare rather than sustainability as a whole (Alonso et al., 2020), and rarely does it seem that consumers demand for the animal feed to be produced sustainably before buying a product (except in the case of organic products (Escribano, 2018)), despite it being a large contributor to environmental impacts from animal-based products (Poore and Nemecek, 2018). This could be due to the mental and physical distance between consumers and the animals/farmers resulting in lack of awareness for this need, and/or the difficulty for consumers to focus on every aspect of the supply chain and to take that into account when they are purchasing a product.
Therefore these issues could somewhat be addressed by a focus on sustainable agriculture to support more plant-based diets. In this way the responsibility for protecting biodiversity falls not just on the farmers or the consumers, but on the whole food industry, which could more effectively incentivize action to halt biodiversity loss.
We hence believe that it is important to consider the transition to a more plant-based food system in the context of bio-diversity. We are currently involved in a research project on sustainable farming investigating this supposition as part of the EU’s UNISECO project in Sweden - exploring a pathway for current livestock farms to reach profitability by diversifying their productions towards including more crops for direct human consumption without increasing animal numbers. Biodiversity is one of several parameters which is included in the study. We would of course be happy to discuss and share the eventual findings of the study.
Furthermore, we would very much emphasize the need to widen the scope of the roadmap to include dietary change and land use given the predicted increase, of 73% and 58% in meat and dairy consumption respectively by 2050 (FAO, 2011), and consequential increase in land use and biodiversity loss if we do nothing.
Read full responseResponse to Environmental claims based on environmental footprint methods
31 Aug 2020
Oatly was founded back in the 1990s and is based on Swedish research from Lund University. The company’s patented enzyme technology copies nature’s own process and turns fiber rich oats into nutritional liquid food that is perfectly designed for humans.
Oatly actively supports the overall objectives of the Commission’s legislative proposal on substantiating green claims. We are acutely aware of the need for global emissions in the production of foodstuffs to be radically reduced. The issue is extremely urgent. For this reason, as a leading producer and distributor of oat-based drinks and dairy alternatives, we have declared our climate footprint on our products since 2019. In calculating our climate footprint from farm to market, we use an independent third party called Carbon Cloud, which base their methodology on over 20 years of research. By declaring the climate footprint on our products in carbon dioxide equivalents (CO2e), absolute numbers, we wish to make it easier for consumers to make informed choices. We know that the food system needs to be transformed to tackle climate change and we also know that consumers are requesting this kind of information so that they can make more informed choices. The climate declaration is a concrete way of giving the consumers the tools and power to make those informed choices - in a time where people are calling out for action and political willpower, faced with an existential climate threat.
Oatly uses the term climate footprint declaration, because we believe in declaring the climate footprint of products in carbon dioxide equivalents (CO2e) in absolute numbers per weight (kg). It is key that the calculation system is objective and science-based. It should be both feasible for the producer and clear as well as understandable for the consumer.
Furthermore, we would argue in favour of a mandatory climate footprint declaration in absolute numbers across all categories of foods, for the following reasons:
o It is a transparent system and we view the climate declaration as a potential incentive for the entire sector to decrease its climate impact.
o It would make it easier for consumers to make informed choices. We know that consumers are requesting information so that they can make these choices and the climate declaration is a concrete way of empowering the consumer to achieve this.
o We believe that it is a consumer's right to know a food product’s emissions.
o It is essential that all foods across categories should be comparable, as it would be highly misleading to the consumer for products to be comparable only within their category.
We feel concerned about the PEF as a starting point for establishing a standard methodology for several reasons, which we explain in more detail in the attached document. We think it is essential to use a method which allows for comparability between all food products whereas PEF only allows for comparison between products in the same category which use the same type of functional unit. Although all environmental impacts are important, we believe that climate impact is the one that needs be addressed the most (biodiversity is also urgent but is not within the scope of PEF). Surveys show that climate change is of the highest concern to both citizens and experts.
In conclusion we believe it is important that all product and service providers declare their climate footprint in absolute and comparable numbers to empower consumers. We would ask for mandatory climate footprint declaration in absolute numbers across all categories of foods. This would enable consumers to measure their footprint in a way that would increase awareness, empowerment and contribute to a change in behavior.
Read full responseResponse to Farm to Fork Strategy
16 Mar 2020
Oatly welcomes the initiative of the Farm to Fork Strategy as a key component of the European Green Deal to tackle challenges linked to climate change and public health, as well as the Commission’s ambition to move swiftly forward. Oatly wants to highlight plant-based processed foods as an essential part of the solution in building a sustainable and resilient food system and future proof economy.
TRANSPARENCY AND CONSUMER RIGHTS
As a fast-growing plant-based company we firmly believe in transparency, the power of consumers and their right to take informed decisions. We need a policy context that facilitates public education and engagement in sustainable consumption as well as enables consumers to take actions to reduce GHG-emissions. Consumers are key in adoption of new solutions, technologies and change in behaviours.
RESEARCH
It is paramount to base the next steps forward on research and to show good examples to inspire the transformation. One such example is the research study of a farm of Adam Arnesson in Sweden, which shows that a transition from predominantly animal based farming to more plant based farming has meant that the GHG emissions from the farm has more than halved, the number of people the produce of the farm can feed has tripled and bio diversity has increased.
More info on the research project: https://www.slu.se/globalassets/ew/org/centrb/fu-food/publikationer/2017/the-sustainable-farm---does-it-exist--aug2017_webb.pdf. The research project has now been extended within the framework of UNISECO. https://uniseco-project.eu/
GROWTH
We are in the process of a consumer driven paradigm shift, driven primarily by conscious and well-informed consumers demanding healthy and sustainably produced plant-based foods. Since 2014 Oatly has grown from being a Swedish food-tech company to a global brand, increasing its turnover from 265 millon SEK in 2014 to about 1 billion SEK in 2018. The average annual growth rate on EU-markets over the period between 2014-2019 exceeds 40% and the global growth rate within the plant-based segment is accelerating. We are recruiting and investing at high pace to respond to the fast-growing demand. In 2014 we had 74 employees. Now we are more than 550 employees. We are growing worldwide, investing in new factories to answer to the growing demand. It is important to us that the supply of oats and vegan ingredients are ensured to answer to this demand.
ACTIONS
In addition to endorsing the position and action plan recommended by Plant foods Sweden, which we enclose, we would suggest the following actions:
• Remove legislation, policies and subsidies distorting the market and hindering the shift to a more plant-based food system, such as e.g. the school milk program and EP amendments 165 and 171 on CAP:CMO (denominations).
• Ensure, at the very least, a level playing field, for new, innovative, plant based processed foods compared to traditional animal-based foods. EU member states should also ensure that national measures, such as e.g. VAT and other taxes do not distort market conditions.
• Encourage investment in R&D in nutritional and sustainable plant based processed foods offering new solutions.
• Introduce measures stimulating and supporting the entire value chain (from farmers to consumers) in the necessary transition to a sustainable and predominantly plant-based food system to tackle challenges linked to climate change, biodiversity and public health.
• Introduce standardised mandatory climate footprint declaration based on LCA-analysis in absolute figures on packages, in the same way as nutrition is declared on products, of all foods and drinks to facilitate for consumers to compare products and make informed decisions which will also help them to calculate their own climate foot print based on consumption.
• Update the EU-regulatory framework on production, distribution and marketing of organic products in the EU to include and promote enriched plant based processed products.
Read full response