To wooenvironment conscious customers, footwear and apparel brand Woodland said thatit will convert all its stores carbon neutral by 2015 as a part of thecompany's corporate social responsibility.
"We have initiated a process under which we willconvert all our (retail) stores to become carbon neutral by 2015. Theinitiative also includes accurate accounting of the carbon footprint of eachstore," Harkirat Singh, managing director, Woodland Worldwide, told IANS.
The term "carbon neutral" implies negation ofcarbon emissions emitted through any operations, by either offsetting thecarbon released by buying carbon credits which are in the form of certificatesor planting tress and using eco-friendly power sources like solar energy.
Changes in the transportation, energy consumption andoperations process are also used by companies to go carbon neutral.
According to Singh, the new initiative which is a part ofthe company's corporate social responsibility (CSR) was activated in July whenthe company started converting 80 of its stores in the national capital regionand Karnataka into carbon neutral.
"The campaign is called Proplanet, through which weintend to negate the carbon footprint of our retail operations. We have alsostarted campaign for planting of saplings," Singh said.
The company has set aside around Rs.10 crore for the projectper annum.
The company added that apart from reducing the retail carbonfootprint, it intends to encouraged customers to use green products across allcategories by providing incentives for every carbon credit earned by thecustomer.
"We will also spread awareness among our customersabout the environment and carbon footprint and credits. We are encourage themto exchange their carbon credits with us for discounts of up to 15-20 percenton our products," Singh added.
One carbon credit is equal to a tonne of carbon dioxideemission. There are two kinds of carbon credits, namely carbon offset creditsthat are earned by using environment friendly forms of energy like solarlighting, and carbon reduction credits.
Carbon reduction credits are earned by initiating measureslike reforestation, planting of tress, maintaining soil erosion among others.