Growing Sustainability
October 27, 2009
A California wine trade association uses third party verification to move the industry toward sustainability
The State of California, long considered a leader in driving national sustainability trends in legislation and industry, will soon add another accomplishment to its résumé. The California Sustainable Winegrowing Alliance (CSWA), a non-profit collaboration between the Wine Institute and the California Association of Winegrape Growers, is in the final stages of developing a third-party certification program, slated to debut in 2010, which furthers its effort to progress their entire industry towards sustainability.
CSWA is recognized for developing a rigorous set of best practices through its voluntary self-assessment program, the Sustainable Winegrowing Program (SWP). The organization is now strengthening the SWP by incorporating third-party verification, thus adding a layer of transparency and credibility to the program. With a large group of vocal stakeholders and a challenging mission to influence the entire California wine industry, CSWA is on its way to establishing a program that will be a leading demonstration of not only how to move a whole industry toward sustainability, but also how third-party-verified management systems can enable companies to credibly integrate sustainability into the fabric of their operations.
Manage what you measure
In spring 2008, CSWA enlisted Five Winds and assurance provider Lloyd's Register Quality Assurance (LRQA) to develop the structure for adding a certification component to the SWP. CSWA sought a program that would drive industry progress towards sustainability and facilitate companies in their efforts to improve environmental practices. Drawing on years of experience in developing successful management systems that support environmental improvements, the Five Winds/LRQA team quickly determined that the program most effective at meeting CSWA's objectives would be one that could structure and hold organizations accountable to the process of continually moving towards sustainability. It was also clear that individual grape growers and wineries face diverse issues related to their involvement in sustainable winemaking. Difference in the locations, sizes, operations, and other business characteristics required a program that easily identifies individual member priorities based on their market and business.
Following the management system example of continual improvement through a plan/do/check/act cycle, taking part in the SWP helps participants understand their sustainability impacts, create an action plan, and measure and demonstrate progress over time (see Figure 1). This ‘process-based' system (or, say as you do and do as you say), as opposed to a ‘performance-based' (get this result) or a ‘prescriptive' (do it this way) system, provides the appropriate blend of accountability, education about best practices, and flexibility to meet diverse needs. "The CSWA program pushes the idea that sustainability is a journey and each organization is at a different place on the path. It is your process for improving performance over time, not your performance today, that will lead to sustainability success," said John Heckman, a Director of Five Winds.
The certification program is intended to be industry-inclusive, with a fundamental objective of steadily improving the overall sustainability of the entire industry (see Figure 2), as opposed to a focus on providing further opportunity for differentiation by current sustainability leaders. Because the program identifies four distinct levels representing a spectrum of performance towards sustainability, it enables all participants to strive toward more sustainable operations. "As members of society, we want the average to improve," said Dr. Heckman. "To reach sustainability, everyone needs to be on board, both the everyman and the leaders."
Heard it through the grape vine
CSWA continues to shape the future through a progressive system that drives a whole industry's movement toward sustainability. In fact, other industries are taking note of this approach. Initiatives responsible for development of sustainability criteria for specialty crops are reviewing the methodology and structure of the SWP, as well as the details of the certification program, in order to define practices that are expected to be more sustainable, identify an improvement process around those practices, and move the average of the whole industry forward.
Benefits for all
Individual companies in any industry can benefit from a third-party-verified management system like that developed by CSWA for grape growers and wineries - management systems lay a foundation and develop accountability for policies and behaviors that drive and measure continual improvement; and third-party verification, much like having houseguests, ensures that the organization follows through on their actions.
For more information on management systems, please contact John Heckman at +1 (303) 442-6969 ext. 1.
Figure 1: The EMS of the CSWA certification program
Figure 2: Moving the "mean" of the industry to sustainability
