April is here, and Earth Month is officially underway. And at Target, investing in sustainability and using natural resources responsibly is an important way we help protect the planet and support our communities. As part of that commitment, we want to do our part to keep the world’s forests healthy, which can have tremendous environmental and community impact.

Last fall, we introduced our responsible sourcing aspirations, including a commitment to sourcing wood-based products from well-managed forests. Today, we’re sharing the details of our new forest products policy. The policy will help Target work toward our long-term aim of sourcing all of the wood, paper, paper-based packaging and wood-based fiber used in Target’s owned-brand products from forests that are well-managed and credibly certified—and whenever possible, from post-consumer recycled materials.

 Along with the new policy, we’re announcing our first goal, focused on several of Target’s owned brands: 

“Target is proud of our commitment to sustainability and healthy communities,” says Kelly Caruso, president, Target Sourcing Services. “We believe this policy is an important step in our journey as a responsible corporate citizen.”

While a change this size will take time, we are committed to identifying new ways of working that will benefit our planet and our guests. We’ll work closely with our vendors, suppliers and other partners to understand the origin of the raw materials in the products and improve the sustainability of forests where the timber in those products was grown. We’ll start with products containing wood or paper-based materials, like tissues and paper towels, wrapping paper, furniture components and even the rayon used in apparel, which comes from a forest product called viscose. And of course, we’ll be working on the brands’ packaging too. 

As the work continues, we’ll report on our progress each year in our Corporate Responsibility Report. And because our product assortment is always changing, we’ll continue to iterate, update and set new goals as needed.

This new forest policy is the second major step in Target’s journey to reduce our supply chain’s impact on deforestation. For example, in 2015, we committed that all palm oil in Target’s owned brand food, personal care and household cleaning products would be fully traceable and sustainably sourced by 2018 or sooner. And in the future, we’ll move from raw materials into commodities such as beef and soy, looking for ways to support our ambition of zero net deforestation—in other words, having as little negative impact on the world’s forests as we can.

Check out our Responsible Sourcing portal to learn more about Target’s work to bring outstanding quality products and services to our guests.

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