Mike Coupe, Trading Director
Sainsbury's is a proud partner of the Scottish food & drink industry and committed to working with the Scottish Government as a signatory to the Retail Charter.
We are committed to promoting Scottish produce in our stores throughout the UK, stocking almost 1500 Scottish lines from 138 Scottish suppliers.
We want to build on the excellent relationships we have with our local suppliers through the new Supplier Development Programme which we launched with Scotland Food & Drink and the Scottish Government earlier this year.
Through our store development and opening programme we will create 1,300 new jobs and look forward to them being in place in our new stores by summer next year.
One of our core values is being best for food & health and this means making healthy choices available to all our customers, regardless of their budget. As such, we support the Government's objective to make Scotland healthier. We use innovative methods, other than just price, to encourage customers to change their shopping behaviour - for example, Tip cards and Feed Your Family For A Fiver TV ads. Our Tip Cards offer simple ideas to customers about trying different, fun ways to cook.
Our Active Kids scheme has donated over £1m worth of equipment to Scottish schools in the past four years and we're delighted to see continued strong interest in our Active Kids Get Cooking scheme from Scottish schools.
We are the largest retailer of RSPCA-accredited Freedom Foods, and all our salmon comes from sustainable farms in Scotland, supporting over 300 jobs in the Highlands. We are excited about the Scottish Government's proposal to support dairy carbon footprint projects, especially as our Dairy Development Group has pioneered the first carbon footprint measurement system of its kind in the industry.
Respect for the environment underpins all our business activities. Earlier this year we started a pilot initiative amongst 21 of our Scottish stores which will see those stores food waste converted into energy.
We look forward to continue to contribute to Scotland's success as the 'Land of Food & Drink'.