● Craft brewery Toast Ale has published its 2020 Impact Report that sets out how the business is leading a movement to change the planet over a pint.
● Toast was the first UK brewery to become a certified B Corp i n 2018 and has been recertified with the highest score of all UK breweries.
● The report includes full details of the brewery’s carbon footprint. It has gone beyond compensating for its emissions by investing in UK regenerative agriculture, making it carbon neutral and nature positive.
Food production is the biggest contributor to climate change and biodiversity loss – it’s responsible for 80% of deforestation, 70% of freshwater use and 34% of greenhouse gas emissions according to the latest study. But one third of all food is wasted.
Toast Ale was founded in 2015 with a mission to reduce food waste by brewing beer with surplus bread.
Influencing wider systemic change is also key to Toast’s mission. It does this by funding charities tackling underlying causes of waste, collaborating with other breweries to lead an industry-wide movement and creating positive conversations to nudge behaviour change.
Today Toast has published its latest impact report that sets out how the business is leading a movement to change the planet over a pint.
Toast Ale is celebrating its B Corp recertification.
Toast Ale became the first UK brewery to certify as a B Corp in 2018. To certify, businesses must demonstrate that they meet the highest standards of verified social and environmental performance, public transparency, and legal accountability to balance profit and purpose.
B Corps must recertify every three years to maintain certification. Toast’s impact report shares the result of the recertification process, which puts Toast as the best performing UK brewery.
The certification process involves an independent assessment of a company’s impact on its workers, customers, community and environment. Toast has set out its impact report to explain the work it is doing under each category.
Under the environment category, it reports its full carbon footprint, which has been audited by ClimatePartner to ensure it aligns with the GHG Protocol. It includes the emission sources and the work needed to reduce emissions to meet the ambitions of the Paris Agreement.
To go beyond carbon neutrality, Toast Ale has invested in UK regenerative agriculture.
Whilst the business works to reduce its emissions to meet its goal to be Net Zero by 2030, it is investing in nature-based solutions to do more than just balancing emissions with removals.
For this, Toast Ale has partnered with Soil Heroes to invest i n UK farms on regenerative journeys.
Regenerative agriculture uses nature-friendly farming practices that include no tilling, fewer chemicals, year-long cover crops and wildflower margins. These practices rebuild soil organic matter and restore biodiversity, resulting i n carbon drawdown and improvements to the water cycle.
Louisa Ziane, Toast’s co-founder & Chief Operating Officer, said “We have been cautious not to make misleading statements about the environmental impact of our business. We leave a footprint on the planet, and we wanted to be fully transparent about the size of that footprint and the work needed to reduce it.”
“We decided to not only compensate for those emissions, but to go much further and regenerate,”” she added. “So we’re investing i n regenerative agriculture. As well as removing CO2 to make us carbon neutral, the enhancement of biodiversity means we can be nature positive. And ultimately, healthy soils are more nutrient rich, giving us better food (and beer).”
Toast’s impact report is available to download via its website here.
Notes for Editors
About Toast Ale (toastale.com | @ toastale)
Toast brews planet-saving beer using surplus fresh bread. This prevents food waste, and reduces the demand for malted barley, and thereby the demand for l and, water and energy. Toast open sources a recipe for home brewers and collaborates with breweries all over the world to scale its impact. All its profits go to charities fixing the food system.
Toast is a social enterprise, a certified B Corp and winner of the 2021 Queen’s Award for Enterprise for Sustainable Development.
Press release from Toast Ale
Contact: Louisa Ziane at louisa@toastale.com