Simpsons Malt has been recognised for its commitment to supply chain sustainability, winning the Farm Sustainability Assessment (FSA) Growing A Better Planet Award.
The FSA is a globally recognised and trusted industry solution for facilitating supply chain collaboration. The award was launched to celebrate the farmers and organisations demonstrating leadership and innovation in their efforts to continuously improve on-farm sustainability.
Simpsons Malt Ltd has had a Farm Management Group verified to the FSA since 2020. It features 419 directly contracted growers. A further group comprises 340 directly-contracted growers, verified in 2022 following the company’s acquisition of W N Lindsay Ltd. The FSA gold levels in each of these groups are 91% and 92% respectively.
When reviewing this year’s shortlist, judges commended the company — which is also a Certified B Corporation — for how pivotal the FSA is to its sustainable sourcing requirements, and how it uses the solution to deliver supply chain engagement. There is an overall aim of achieving carbon neutral malting barley and distilling wheat production by 2030.
Simpsons is aided in directly influencing sustainability practices on-farm by having agricultural merchanting division, McCreath Simpson & Prentice (MSP), integrated into the business.
MSP supplies farm inputs to growers across Scotland and northern England, and this has enabled strategic partnerships to be formed with major agricultural businesses, including Yara UK and OCI Nitrogen, on the supply and trial of low-carbon fertilisers for harvest 2024, and BASF Agricultural Solutions on a unique carbon reduction and removals certification programme.
“As both a malting and agricultural merchanting business, the FSA has been an important platform in helping us to engage directly with our malting barley and distilling wheat suppliers, and we now have more than 750 growers verified to the FSA in two separate Farm Management Groups, both of which are more than 90% gold level,” said Ben Gothorp, sustainability manager at Simpsons Malt.
“One of our overarching company objectives is to achieve carbon neutral malting barley and distilling wheat production by 2030, and we’re pleased that this global award recognises the positive steps we are making towards this.”
