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Our approach to sustainability is about delivering impact faster with more focused, urgent and systemic action across our big four sustainability priorities: Climate, Nature, Plastics and Livelihoods.
This page provides an overview of the actions we're taking on livelihoods. Keep scrolling to learn more.
We’re working to improve the livelihoods of the people who grow our ingredients, make and sell our products. Not only does this support people’s standards of living and drive wider economic growth, but it also makes our business more resilient.
Since 2020, we have ensured that all our employees receive a living wage, as outlined in our Framework for Fair Compensation established in 2014.
At Hindustan Unilever Limited, respecting human rights is a non-negotiable condition of doing business with us. Our long-term ambition is to provide a decent livelihood for people in our value chain and help them earn a living wage. A decent livelihood enables people to at least afford the essentials of daily life for themselves and their families through work that is secure, dignified, and fair.
We believe that we can help raise standards of living for not only those who work with us but also impact the communities where we operate. Our approach focuses on implementation programmes and collective action. We are working with our suppliers to achieve living wages at affordable costs by using digital tools, automation and upskilling people.
Since 2020, we have ensured that all our employees receive a living wage, as outlined in our Framework for Fair Compensation established in 2014.
All HUL sites operate under Collective Bargaining Agreements and align with the International Labour Organisation’s (ILO) principles. Our suppliers adhere to Unilever’s Responsible Partner Policy (RPP), which supports governance and corporate responsibility. By upholding these standards in our value chain, we ensure that our business practices promote human dignity and fairness.
Our commitment to fair compensation goes beyond statutory requirements. We pay above-minimum wages across our supply chain units. The Variable Dearness Allowance (VDA), linked to the Cost Price Index (CPI), adjusts for inflation, ensuring that wages keep pace with rising living costs. Our goal is to enable employees to afford a decent standard of living, including healthcare, education, housing, and other essentials. We also regularly review gender pay parity to ensure our compensation practices meet industry benchmarks.
Unilever’s Responsible Partner Policy includes a mandatory requirement for our suppliers to pay a living wage to their workers by 2030.
We’ve started closing the gap between pay and living wage with suppliers closest to our business. Nearly all factories that produce only for Unilever have a contractual requirement to pay a living wage and almost all labour agencies that provide workers for our factories now pay a living wage.
Our efforts to raise living standards extend to thousands of small farmers, distributors, and retailers in our supply chain, many of whom are women.
Economic growth and financial inclusion are critical to reducing poverty. HUL provides financial solutions for retailers and customers in both rural and urban markets. Through collaborations with financial partners, we offer retailers instant, paperless working capital loan facilities for their billings with distributors. Digital payment options enhance ease of use, while negotiated terms ensure credit affordability. This initiative helps retailers expand their businesses and integrate them into the formal financial system.
Our digital eB2B application ‘Shikhar’ enables retailers to browse HUL products, prices, promotions, place orders, and see which products are selling well. This creates a better experience for our retailers and helps them increase their sales. To support retailers, our kirana-centric proposition on Shikhar focuses on two key pillars: Buy Smarter and Sell More.
Buy Smarter: This approach ensures that Shikhar retailers can purchase products that are relevant to them and have higher probability of offtake leading to better store efficiency.
Sell More: This allows Shikhar retailers to sell more products to their shoppers by becoming more discoverable in their local neighbourhood through various initiatives available on Shikhar including selling through the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) module on Shikhar, participating in Gen AI-powered campaigns to curate and customise store level content, among others.
Aligned with our mission of ‘Doing well by doing good,’ our flagship initiative, Shakti continues to empower over 2 lakh Shakti Ammas in rural India through entrepreneurship training for better livelihoods and financial independence.
Project Shakti has significantly benefitted women in rural India by boosting their self-confidence, improving their self-esteem, and enhancing their communication and sales skills. Additionally, Shakti Ammas receive training to become advocates for good health and nutrition, positively impacting hundreds of thousands of households in their villages.
Moreover, direct bank transfers for Shakti incentives help rural women enter the formal banking sector, fostering financial inclusion.
2 lakh+ women entrepreneurs in our Shakti network
Focusing on livelihoods, economic empowerment, health and nutrition, and environmental sustainability, Prabhat operates several livelihood centres that train women and youth in vocational skills and entrepreneurship development.
Training includes data entry, IT, electrical work, plumbing, solar technology, tailoring, and beauty services. Prabhat promotes inclusivity by creating opportunities for people with disabilities, widows, and other vulnerable groups.
97,000+ people have secured employment
1.6 lakh+ people have received skill development and training
39,000+ farmers benefited through farm-based value chain initiatives
In 2022, we launched the Skills Academy for Advancement of Livelihoods (SAFAL)—our flagship programme to help strengthen India’s retail and frontline sales value chain. SAFAL focuses on enhancing employment, employability and entrepreneurship for women, youth and persons with disabilities across the sales and retail ecosystem.
SAFAL has set up Sales Pro Academy centres in five cities to train and place youth in frontline sales roles.
SAFAL also launched Didi ki Dukaan—in partnership with YuWaah UNICEF—to enable 1,000 first generation nano women retailers in villages across Rajasthan, Odisha and Jharkhand.
The programme also works with existing small retailers in urban centres, building capabilities to strengthen business continuity and growth.
Built on the principles of collaboration and catalytic impact at scale, SAFAL is partnering with the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE) to make its curriculum available on the Government of India’s Skill India Digital Hub (SIDH)—making HUL the first FMCG company to be onboarded on the platform.
3.2 lakh young people benefitted in 21 states and union territories
Despite their valuable role, waste workers continue to be at the forefront of various challenges including marginalisation and social exclusion, increased vulnerability to climate and natural disasters, low and unsteady incomes and health risks. HUL’s Social Inclusion Programme is a first-of-its-kind programme that focuses on linking waste workers with government social protection schemes, including Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana, Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana, E-SHRAM card, and Jan Dhan account.
Our intervention has enabled over 35,000 Safai Mitras get access to government social protection schemes covering food, health, identity, safety, education and financial inclusion.
35,000+ Safai Mitras benefitted and linkage to 71,000 government schemes unlocked
We work towards improving the standard of living of dairy farmers through our programs that enable sustainable livelihoods, women empowerment, and health and sanitisation.
By focusing on the overall ecosystem of dairy farmers – milk production, cattle health, use of waste from dairy animals, soil and crop productivity and other affiliated activities, we are ensuring holistic dairy development in communities. Our awareness programmes help disseminate knowledge and best practices that, in turn, help increase yield, build better farmer livelihoods and reduce climate impact.
Our initiatives, ‘Baani’ in North India and ‘Moomark’ in South India, aim to support over 2,000 farmers. These farmers supply milk to bulk milk collection centers located in villages near our dairy supplier in Nabha, Patiala district, Punjab, and around HUL’s Rajahmundry Factory.
2,000+ dairy farmers empowered in south and north of India
Recognising the entrenched social issues within the tea industry, our priority is to uphold the human rights of tea workers and smallholder farmers while enhancing their health and financial security.
In response to concerning instances of human rights violations, particularly violence against women, and low worker wages in the tea sector, we've implemented innovative programs in collaboration with partners.
Under our social impact programmes, we aim to improve lives in India's tea supply chain. Safety is crucial for sustainable development. Tea employs about 1.2 million workers, mainly women. The sector faces women's human rights issues, similar to other agricultural value chains.
In 2024, we launched the Women Safety Accelerator Fund 2.0 (WSAF 2.0) a programme that targets systemic issues related to safety, sustainability and equity in tea estates. Aligned with international sustainability and gender equity goals, the initiative emphasises on response mechanisms for gender-based violence and empowering women.
WSAF initially launched in 2020 is a collaborative effort involving organisations such as Unilever, IDH and other tea companies. The fund implements the UN Women's Global Women’s Safety Framework in rural areas, focusing on creating safe, violence-free workplaces for women in the tea industry.
The programme builds awareness and understanding of gender based violence supports tea producers in strengthening prevention and response mechanisms, and helps comply with the law to create safe spaces. The current phase focusses on digital and data-driven solutions for gender based violence cases, enhanced livelihood, and financial literacy support.
In the current phase of the program, we are also covering sexual and reproductive health and rights, digital financial literacy, livelihood opportunities and migration awareness to safeguard workers and their families from risks associated with unsafe migration.
2.8 lakh+ tea workers have benefitted in 2025 across 291 tea estates
We’re helping smallholder farmers who grow our key crops increase their incomes.
Our regenerative agriculture programmes help smallholders working with dairy, vegetables, tea, coconut, black soy, cereals and spices conserve water, look after the soil and use fewer chemicals. This helps boost yields and builds farmers’ resilience, while also replenishing the land.
We support farmers in implementing practices such as cover cropping, crop rotation, planting green manure crops, and using natural alternatives to synthetic fertilisers. This includes promoting compost production through on-farm resource recycling and integrated soil management.
Our tea programme aims to build climate resilience and crop sustainability by implementing regenerative agricultural practices. Similarly, our coffee programme seeks to mitigate climate change risks affecting Indian coffee production. Enabling sustainable livelihood models with diversified incomes for smallholder farmers is a crucial part of these programmes.
61,000 Ha+ of land under regenerative agriculture programmes
The Unilever regenerative agriculture principles (PDF 8.34 MB)
TRANSFORM, led by Unilever, the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, and Ernst & Young (EY), is an impact accelerator program that brings together corporates, donors, investors, and academics to support visionary enterprises across Africa, Asia, and beyond. Since its establishment in 2015, TRANSFORM has combined grant funding, business insight, and research to test and scale new solutions and innovative business models. These efforts aim to increase livelihoods, improve health, implement regenerative agriculture practices, and create new models for plastic recycling and refilling.
23 enterprises funded by TRANSFORM in India alone, positively affecting the lives of over 7.5 million people.
Help 2,50,000 smallholder farmers in our supply chain access livelihoods programmes by 2026
Suppliers representing 50% of our procurement spend to sign the Living Wage Promise by 2026
Help 2.5 million SMEs in our retail value chain grow their business by 2026
We’ve been working hard to create a circular economy for plastic packaging for a number of years. We’ve learnt that transformation takes time. Given the size of this challenge, we’re using our innovation capabilities to find new, scalable solutions.
Climate action has long been a part of how we do business. But the world must move faster to avoid the worst effects of climate change. We've set more ambitious climate targets and identified clearer actions to respond to this challenge.
The world – and our business – needs resilient natural and agricultural ecosystems to thrive. We’re committed to contributing to the protection and regeneration of nature, within and beyond our value chain.
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