Case study:

As the world's largest retailer with more than 8,400 stores globally, Walmart moves massive amounts of

products and uses massive amounts of power and other resources to operate its business. But it's also

striving to transform itself into a company that's seen as environmentally friendly. That's why the

company's announcement that it would cut some 20 million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions

from its supply chainthe equivalent of removing more than 3.8 million cars from the road for a

yeargot widespread attention. This announcement came a few months after the company said that it

would be creating a sustainability index of just how green its products are. The first part of Walmart's

three-phase plan was getting information from its more than 100,000 suppliers using a 15-question

survey about their greenhouse gas emissions, water and solid waste reduction efforts, and other details

about business practices. That information was received by October 2009, and the second-phase

process of entering it into a massive database began. The third phase involves getting all that data

eventually condensed into an easily understood universal rating system, similar to a nutrition label but

focused on details about environmental and social sustainability. However, it's likely that this effort

won't be

complete until 2013.This isn't the company's first push toward being green. Walmart has started many

environmental initiatives in recent years including improving the efficiency of its truck fleet and working

with 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, which produces DVDs, to cut greenhouse gas emissions by

eliminating the plastic knob in the center of its CD cases. The most difficult part of this latest green

initiative has been persuading its suppliers to spend the time and money tracking and lessening their

environmental impact. Essentially, suppliers are being asked to "examine the carbon lifecycle of their

products, from the raw materials used in manufacturing all the way through to the recycling phase."

Although supplier participation was not mandatory, Walmart made it clear that it was interested in

doing business only with suppliers that shared its goals.

Q 1. What do you think of Walmart's green initiatives? Will it ever be able to achieve the

reputation of being environmentally friendly? Discuss.

Q 2. Why do you think suppliers might be reluctant to be involved in this initiative? How might

that reluctance be addressed? Although it said supplier participation was not mandatory, does Walmart

appear to be "forcing" suppliers to participate?