Description: Dutch upscale supermarket Ekoplaza has introduced a plastics-free aisle. You can find your grocery items wrapped in cardboard or paper, or packaged in metal or glass, but you won’t find any plastic in one aisle. The grocery chain wants to expand this program to all of its stores in face of the notion that only 9% of the plastic produced has been recycled. With much of it ending up in the oceans, NPO A Plastic Planet added that this was “a landmark moment for the global fight against plastic pollution.” Something needs to be done before the volume of plastic in our oceans exceeds the volume of fish.

Date: February 28, 2018

Source:  nytimes.com

Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/28/business/netherlands-plastic-supermarket.html

1) Check out your food inventory at home. What percentage of your food items are stored in plastic?

2) From a strategic basis, what may have prompted Ekoplaza to take this decision?

3) In chapter 1 of Wiley’s  Auditing: A Practical Approach, Moroney et al discuss the emerging area of corporate social responsibility (CSR)  assurance. If you were an auditor approached by a store such as Ekoplaza for a CSR engagement, what would be some of your key questions in determining whether or not to accept the engagement?