London — Mars, the maker of its namesake chocolate bar and Wrigley’s chewing gum, is spending $1bn on sustainability with a strategy to make greener practices increase profits."There is a very concrete business case to this," Barry Parkin, chief procurement and sustainability officer at Mars, said in a phone interview. "We’re going to get a payback on that billion several times over."The company is closely held by the founding Mars family and generated $35bn in revenues in 2016. It has about 85,000 employees and does a lot more than just candy. Its five businesses span food products, such as Uncle Ben’s rice, drinks, petcare, as well as a division that researches nutrients in cocoa known as flavanols.The Paris climate deal struck in 2015 by representatives from almost 200 countries sent a signal to the global economy that de-carbonisation is rising on the political agenda. Industries from oil to finance are starting to assess the risks of inaction on environmental issues. Mars’s eff...
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