Our water agenda
From making to using our products, the IKEA value chain relies on safe, available and affordable water. To help manage the use of this shared and important natural resource across our value chain, IKEA is supporting actions aimed at improving water security, protecting nature, helping communities and collaborating with others to inspire a widespread water action in society.
Our focus areas
Our focus areas connected to water consider where we have the most influence and opportunities for impact. Learn more about our current initiatives.
Strengthening our approach to water stewardship
We developed a water stewardship tool to support suppliers in developing action plans to reduce freshwater withdrawal and strengthen overall water stewardship practices. The tool, based on the Alliance for Water Stewardship’s five-step process – gather and understand, commit and plan, implement, evaluate, and communicate & disclose – aims to help suppliers assess site-specific water risks, identify gaps, develop and track action plans, and share progress transparently, and is now being piloted with a small number of suppliers.
Collaborating with ZDHC’s Roadmap to Zero Programme
We joined and began collaborating with ZDHC’s Roadmap to Zero Programme to advance chemical management and reduce water impacts across our supply chain.
Through this programme, we are supporting our suppliers with better tools and knowledge to protect water resources and biodiversity across our supply chain, working closely with industry partners and suppliers to implement changes, track progress, and share results. As we take this next step in our work with chemicals, we will continue to explore innovative ways to reduce chemical use in our supply chain, with the goal of minimising negative impacts on the environment and human health.
Joining the Freshwater Challenge Business Supporter Program
We joined the Freshwater Challenge Business Supporter Program (FWC BSP). Voluntary and country-led, the Freshwater Challenge (FWC) is the world’s largest freshwater ecosystem restoration and protection initiative with the ambition to restore 300,000 kilometers of degraded rivers and 350 million hectares of degraded wetlands by 2030, while securing the protection of freshwater ecosystems important for biodiversity and ecosystem services.
Businesses have a critical role to play to help member countries achieve the ambitious goals of the FWC. By joining the FWC BSP, we will contribute to the goals of the challenge by leading projects where we, together with long-standing partners like WWF, actively engage in the protection and improvement of biodiversity, water quality, and quantity in degraded ecosystems in our priority river basins and beyond.
This will start with two IKEA and WWF projects in river basins in India and Turkey, promoting water stewardship and collective action to find shared solutions for better water management and a more sustainable textile industry.