Launched in 2012, Origin Green is the national sustainability programme for the Irish food and drink industry. It is the only sustainability programme in the world which operates on a national scale, uniting government, the private sector and food and drink producers, through Bord Bia, the Irish Food Board. Since the inception of Origin Green, over 137,000 carbon assessments have been completed on Irish beef and dairy farms, where Dawn Meats sources livestock for processing. These audits have provided over 25 million data points on the performance of Irish farms in relation to sustainable practices.
Dawn Meats has been actively involved and supportive of the Origin Green program since its inception. One of only 8 companies that sponsor the Origin Green Ambassador programme, Dawn Meats has continuously advocated membership of Origin Green and offered support & advice to other member companies. As one of the first verified members of Origin Green we have progressively submitted more ambitious annual Origin Green targets since our earliest plan in 2012. Our sustainability plan makes many commitments including: energy, water, emissions, waste, raw material sourcing, biodiversity, people and community. Under energy, water and emissions we have made significant progress and on average over the last 4 years we have made the following equivalent savings across the group: