Retail Council of Canada has named Walmart Inc. Executive Vice President and Chief Sustainability Officer Kathleen McLaughlin and SC Johnson Chairman and CEO Fisk Johnson as the inaugural recipients of its Sustainable Leaders of the Year Award.
The new recognition will be presented as part of RCC’s Retail Sustainability Excellence Awards on October 28. It recognizes executives who have advanced measurable environmental progress across the retail value chain, including supply-chain transformation, product innovation and environmental impact.
“This is the first time we have presented this award, and we set the bar high,” said Kim Furlong, President and CEO of Retail Council of Canada.
Furlong said McLaughlin was selected in part for translating Walmart’s climate commitments into measurable action across thousands of suppliers, while Johnson has pushed issues including plastic waste and chemical transparency into the policy arena. Both, she said, demonstrate how sustainability commitments can translate into action across the retail industry.
McLaughlin’s Work Across Walmart’s Supply Chain
McLaughlin leads Walmart Inc.’s sustainability strategy across sourcing, supply chains and community resilience. She chairs the Walmart Foundation board after spending more than a decade as its president and previously spent more than 20 years at McKinsey & Company, where she led its Retail Practice.
Central to her work at Walmart has been Project Gigaton, the retailer’s supplier-focused initiative launched in 2017. Walmart set a goal of working with suppliers to reduce, avoid or sequester one billion metric tonnes of greenhouse-gas emissions from product value chains by 2030.
In 2024, Walmart announced that participating suppliers had reported projects expected to exceed the one-billion-metric-tonne threshold, reaching the target more than six years ahead of schedule. More than 5,900 suppliers participated in Project Gigaton.
Walmart’s methodology allows qualifying projects to include anticipated emissions impacts through 2030. As a result, the milestone incorporates some reductions, avoided emissions or sequestration expected to occur after the company announced the result, rather than representing only emissions already eliminated.
Project Gigaton also has a Canadian connection. Walmart Canada joined the initiative in 2019, when more than 200 of its Canadian suppliers had already made commitments under the program. Participants included Maple Leaf Foods, Unilever Canada and Agropur Cooperative.
The program covers energy, waste, packaging, agriculture, forestry and product use. Some of those measures have implications beyond emissions targets, particularly where changes to transportation, energy consumption and packaging can affect operating costs and supply-chain efficiency.
Fisk Johnson’s Focus on Plastics and Regulation
Johnson has served as Chairman and CEO of family-owned SC Johnson since 2004 and joined the company in 1987. His environmental work has included plastic waste reduction, renewable energy, carbon reduction, green chemistry and greater transparency around product ingredients.
One of Johnson’s more prominent policy priorities has been Extended Producer Responsibility, commonly known as EPR, which places greater responsibility for managing packaging at the end of its useful life on the companies that produce it.
His advocacy has a direct Canadian connection. When Johnson appeared before the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works in March 2024 to advocate for EPR legislation for consumer packaging, he pointed to British Columbia’s system as an example of how such a framework can operate.
Under the B.C. model highlighted by Johnson, producers and brand owners assume financial and operational responsibility for collecting, sorting and recycling packaging. Johnson has argued that EPR can also give businesses an incentive to redesign packaging, increase recycled content and develop reuse and refill systems.
RCC cited Johnson’s work on plastics and chemical transparency, along with his support for an international treaty addressing plastic pollution, in recognizing him with the inaugural award.
Canadian Retailers Among 60 Sustainability Finalists
The two executive awards are part of a broader sustainability recognition program being introduced by RCC. Sixty finalists have been selected across 10 Retail Sustainability Excellence Award categories, covering operational waste diversion, community impact, data and traceability, facilities decarbonization, sustainable products and packaging, low-carbon logistics, recycled content, reuse and take-back programs, and supply-chain impact.
The list includes some of Canada’s largest retailers and consumer-facing businesses. Sobeys, IKEA Canada, Canada Goose, Tim Hortons, Canadian Tire Corporation, Holt Renfrew, Roots Corporation, Longo’s Brothers Fruit Market, Sleep Country Canada and Staples Canada are among the finalists.
Several companies are represented in multiple categories. Sobeys is a finalist for back-of-store circularity and operational waste reduction, data, transparency and traceability innovation, and energy and facilities decarbonization. IKEA Canada appears in categories covering operational waste, community impact, low-carbon logistics, and reuse, refill and take-back programs.
The categories point to where sustainability spending and regulation are increasingly intersecting with retail operations. Energy use in stores and distribution centres, fleet investments, packaging, waste handling and supplier requirements all carry cost and operational implications alongside their environmental objectives.
That is particularly evident in programs such as Project Gigaton, where initiatives involving transportation efficiency, packaging, energy consumption and waste can change how products are manufactured, shipped and ultimately sold. For large retailers, sustainability strategy is increasingly tied to decisions already being made across procurement, logistics, real estate and supplier management.
The Sustainable Leaders of the Year Award and the individual Retail Sustainability Excellence Awards will be presented October 28 following RCC’s Retail Sustainability Conference.
Retail Council of Canada represents businesses ranging from independent retailers to major national chains, with its membership encompassing more than 65,000 storefronts across the country.
