Rishi Sunak is planning a ‘Green Day’ this week, in which the government is expected to announce a battery of environmental policies and updates. 

It’s understood the PM wants to get back on the front foot amid concerns Labour is dominating the environmental agenda.

Indeed, it seems a very long time ago that Boris Johnson was warning world leaders at Glasgow’s COP26 we were effectively at “one minute to midnight” as the clock ticked down towards the extinction of human life.

Since then, not only has time run out for Johnson but it has stood still – or gone backwards – when it comes to many of the government’s key environmental promises.

When it comes to the food industry, there are a whole host of flagship proposals mired in delays and confusion. The future of the deposit return scheme has become not just a divisive election issue in Scotland, but a source of bitter in-fighting in Westminster. Ministers have threatened to block the rollout over fears it will heap more inflation on stretched consumers.

Now it looks as though DRS in danger of going down the drain altogether, despite more than £100m in investment having been ploughed into the scheme north of the border.

Meanwhile, there is further trouble for that other troublesome acronym: EPR (Extended Producer Responsibility). Talks have been described as a “fiasco”, and at last count, Defra was yet to answer as many as 800 questions from the industry – just six months before it’s due to come into force.

Today, MPs on the Efra Committee grilled environment secretary and Defra permanent secretary Tamara Finkelstein over reports of “poor morale” and high staff vacancies at the department, said to be creaking under an avalanche of EU policies they have been given to try to unpick.

Defra secretary Thérèse Coffey faced more criticism over supermarket shortages and the UK’s precarious food security, as well, of course – plus various turnip puns – following her last outing before MPs.

So not for the first time, it would have been interesting to be a fly on the wall as Defra this week summoned leaders from the food industry for talks on its plans. There is speculation Sunak is planning a series of incentives to encourage companies to invest in green technologies and commit to zero carbon.

But it’s not just the government making significant announcements on the environment this week.

Today, the UK’s biggest supermarkets signed what was described as an “unprecedented” collaboration in the battle against climate change.

Aldi, Co-op, Lidl, M&S, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s, Tesco and Waitrose will spend this year agreeing on a common system of reporting for Scope 3 supply chain emissions. From next year, they will begin the action and put in the necessary investment.

Like the initiatives from the government, this announcement has not come a moment too soon. In November, The Grocer revealed how Scope 3 emissions from the sector had actually gone backwards since the Glasgow milestone.

While it’s encouraging to see the UK’s supermarkets committing to change, the reality is the biggest barriers will not come from the top eight.

The threat to climate change and emissions will come from the long trail of food companies in the supply chain. Those are the same companies that are struggling to get their heads around the chaos of the government environmental agenda, who lack the resources or shareholder incentives of the big supermarkets. They need incentives to make the same progress (like the ones that will hopefully materialise this week). 

It’s going to take the government more than a day to fix that that issue, but if it is serious about reinvigorating the green agenda, it needs to tackle these challenges head on.

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