P.PSH.1349 - Pardoo Beef Building a sustainable wagyu operation

Summary

Given the increasing global consumer, regulatory and industry awareness of sustainable practices, Pardoo has embarked on this project to set a clear sustainability strategy and roadmap for the future. The key objective of this project is to progress Pardoo’s mission to measure and manage a sustainable system that supports and develops their people and their land.

Objectives

The key objectives of this project were to:
- develop Pardoo Wagyu's sustainability strategy and roadmap of tactics
- create Unique Selling Propositions that enable Pardoo to talk about their sustainability journey in a meaningful way in market
- complete a carbon baseline for northern operations to understand key drivers of emissions
- develop sustainability dashboards to track impact and progress accurately and regularly on Pardoo’s sustainability journey.

Key findings

The outcomes of this project were a Sustainability Strategy to guide Pardoo over the next 1–10 years, an understanding of how Pardoo will move up the sustainability investment curve and a roadmap of tactics, clearly defined Unique Selling Propositions for Pardoo to take to market, ~12 sustainability dashboards showing ~15 metrics across Pardoo’s three strategic priorities and a carbon baseline.

Benefits to industry

There were many key lessons discovered as part of this project which have applications for the broader industry, the top three insights being:
- Some producers, like Pardoo, may be doing more around sustainability than they speak about in the market that should be communicated to their customers and consumers.
- Any sustainability strategy needs to consider business growth plans to ensure success. This means accounting for periods where there will be lower investment but increased focus on high-value opportunities.
- Markets have various levels of maturity when it comes to sustainability and different expectations. Some markets, such as Singapore, put much higher importance on sustainability being part of a brand story. In contrast, interviews have indicated that in markets such as the UAE, only a few are asking about sustainability. All interviews however shared a resounding feeling that sustainability is only going to increase in importance and become a right to play.

MLA action

• In terms of the broader industry, it could be an opportunity for MLA to build an industry-wide
• Sustainability dashboard so producers, regulators, media, and other key stakeholders can track the
• industry’s progress in a way that is engaging and informative, whilst also creating a benchmark for
  producers looking to do the same to follow.

Future research

To continue Pardoo's journey towards a sustainable production system, there are three recommended extensions for this project:
1. Retention strategy: one of the key opportunities identified for Pardoo was to develop a retention strategy to address common themes across employee engagement and ensure a thriving culture.
2. ESRM Report: Pardoo Station's ESRM report provides valuable information on the management of the land, this could extend to Pardoo's northern properties at another stage.
3. Extend dashboards: continue to enhance the sustainability dashboards and build the database supporting them, so they can be public-facing increasing transparency and
accountability.