Where Does Your Food Come From?

LIDL Receives Damning Scores In Oxfam Working Conditions

Report

Lovinmalta.com July 10, 2019

Lidl is one of Europe’s leading supermarket chains. However, the international giant recently
received one of the worst scores in Oxfam’s report on the working conditions of the people who
produce the food that ends up on our shelves.

The report forms part of the #BehindTheBarcodes campaign and is geared at improving the lives of
workers who are “trapped in poverty and face brutal working conditions”.

For the scorecard, Oxfam assessed some of the world’s leading supermarkets’ publicly disclosed
policies and practices in four key areas: transparency, which includes informing consumers about
where food comes from, conditions for workers, conditions for small-scale farmers and tackling
discrimination against women.

With a total score of 9/100, Lidl scored 24/100 when it came to transparency, 6/100 with regards to
the conditions of workers, 8/100 for the conditions for farmers… and an abysmal zero when it came
to women.

The giant’s score actually improved from 2018, jumping up from 5% to 9%. However, they’re still one
of the lowest ranking European supermarket chains in the report.

On the whole, Oxfam found that Europe’s biggest supermarkets have made slow progress to remove
human suffering from their global food supply chains, with the UK’s Tesco’s (38/100) and
Sainsbury’s (23/100) recording the highest scores.
Lead-In Questions:

1. Do you shop at big supermarket chains like LIDL? What is your opinion of them generally? What
are the benefits and drawbacks of such chains?

2. Do you think about where your products come from before you buy them?

3. Would you choose different products if you know they are ethically sourced?

Language: ethical sourcing, fair trade, sustainability, brand image

Questions after reading:

1. What is your opinion of the #BehindTheBarcodes campaign?

2. Can you think of any other policies and practices that are important when it comes to good
working conditions more generally?

3. Do you have any ideas why LIDL might have scored so low? Would this change your mind about
shopping there?

4. Do you think consumers are partly responsible for removing suffering from the process of
producing goods, or should the responsibility belong to the companies?

5. What can companies do to remove suffering from supply chains?