Many of our suppliers operate in regions where water stress is a growing threat. We work with production suppliers to improve water management in their operations.

To identify supplier sites in water-stressed areas, we use water risk assessment tools such as World Business Council for Sustainable Development’s Global Water Tool and the World Resources  Institute’s Aqueduct Water Risk Atlas tool. We also identify sites that manufacture water-intense product types and use this information to assess o6verall water stress risks and opportunities. We ask our suppliers to report water risk, use, and management information through our CDP Supply Chain membership. This drives suppliers’ awareness of water security issues and allows us to assess suppliers’ current water management strategies in the context of local environments and communities. 

We work with suppliers to improve water reporting and, when appropriate, we also work with suppliers to enhance water management practices, through use of best practice frameworks. To further drive improvements, in 2018 we added water stewardship criteria to our supplier Sustainability Scorecard. Suppliers are scored for transparently reporting quantitative water use as well as for having a public company-wide water policy or governance structure for water at the board of directors or top executive level.

In 2020, the most recent year for which data is available, production suppliers withdrew 36 million cubic meters of water associated with HP, 3% less than in 2019. We believe that stronger supplier water-accounting practices contributed to year-over-year variations in data. By the end of 2020, 94% of our suppliers, by spend, had set water management goals.