Catherine Hine
Feeding decisions and journeys are shaped by a complex ecosystem of families, communities, workplaces, governments, as well as service providers. In the UK, this ecosystem is not giving women and families the support they need. Of women who want to breastfeed, 80% stop before they want to[1].
As we mark World Breastfeeding Week 2025 and this year’s theme, ‘Prioritise Breastfeeding: Create Sustainable Support Systems,’ I find myself wondering why breastfeeding isn’t already a recognised component of the ESG (Environmental, Social, Governance) requirements of companies and large organisations. It should be. Here’s a starter-for-ten on why.
Breastfeeding and the environment
Breastfeeding is environmentally sustainable, and if a mother wants to and can breastfeed, there’s benefit to the planet if we can all get behind this. Breastfeeding itself requires no factories, packaging, transportation, or waste. Breast milk even adapts dynamically to environmental factors, including weather conditions and local pathogens, providing uniquely efficient and tailored nutrition[2].
There’s a positive opportunity to impact carbon emissions. Commercial formula production has a carbon footprint at least double that of breastfeeding[3]. This is because of the resource-intensive processes involved in dairy farming, manufacturing, packaging, and global distribution, including greenhouse gas emissions from dairy cows and waste from single-use packaging.
While breastfeeding may have some environmental impact – such as increased food consumption for mum and the use of reusable bottles, disposable storage bags, and energy for expressed milk – these environmental impacts are a great deal smaller than for formula production. Encouraging and supporting any breastfeeding where this is the preference of the family helps reduce environmental harm and aligns with living sustainably within the planet’s ecological limits[4].
Breastfeeding and social impact
The second component of ESG is social sustainability and impact. The UN Global Compact is the world’s largest corporate sustainability initiative, a United Nations pact to get businesses and firms to adopt sustainable and socially responsible policies, and to report on their implementation. Companies express their support for the principle that their so-called ‘social license’ to operate is connected with meaningful action on inequality, poverty, and fairness[5].
Strong bonds between parent and baby during the first 1,001 days support brain development, positive later outcomes, emotional wellbeing, and can reduce the probability of social disadvantage[6]. Breastfeeding promotes a strong emotional connection through physical interaction and release of the hormone, oxytocin, and so can be supportive of the formation of these bonds, contributing to long-term social impact.
Without strong maternity protection by government and employers – which includes protection of breastfeeding[7]– women are less likely to be retained in the workplace, and therefore less likely to be promoted to more senior roles. Ultimately this means that action to support breastfeeding can impact career progression, pay and for larger organisations, performance on compulsory gender pay gap reporting.[8]
Yet, for most women, combining breastfeeding with paid work is a great deal tougher than it should be. Legal protections are limited[9] and workplace policy and practice often fall short: a lack of suitable breaks, private spaces for feeding or expressing, flexible working schedules or locations mean women frequently compromise their breastfeeding goals. Women with low-paid and insecure jobs are both more likely to need to return to work early and less likely to have the bargaining power at work to negotiate the flexibility[10] to support continued breastfeeding. This means women from minoritised racial backgrounds, disabled mothers, and single parents are statistically likely to face even greater barriers to continued breastfeeding at work[11].
Beyond their workplace commitments, businesses and organisations can deepen trust and wellbeing with families by joining breastfeeding-friendly schemes like BfN’s, by training staff to create supportive cultures for breastfeeding (contact us for more details), and encouraging employees who want to train and volunteer to provide breastfeeding support in the wider community[12].
Governance matters
The ‘G’ in ESG often gets less attention. Without strong governance, environmental and social sustainability commitments lack ethical grounding and can fall by the wayside[13]. A real commitment to breastfeeding means setting clear targets for organisational support, actively monitoring progress and explicitly linking family-friendly working to values. Director and Board-level leadership can champion action on becoming breastfeeding friendly in their organisations and senior women leaders, with lived experience of breastfeeding and early parenthood, are well-placed to ask how organisations are considering being breastfeeding friendly in their decision-making and practices.
Organisations of all kinds have financial objectives. The commercial formula industry invests $55 billion annually in marketing that exploits parents’ concerns about doing the best for their children as business opportunities. This industry strategy is a real and often devastating impediment to women’s breastfeeding goals and confidence[14].
Committed organisations can take their breastfeeding friendly and early years commitments further and make real impact by following the WHO Code on Marketing of Breast Milk Substitutes[15] in their own conduct and using tools like the ATNi Index to guide ethical investment practice and shareholder advocacy[16].
Making breastfeeding a priority together
This World Breastfeeding Week 2025 is a chance for us all to commit to go further, to ensure women and families can access the support they need to meet their infant feeding goals. It’s a moment to recognise the environmental, social and governance implications of serious action on breastfeeding. If you’d like to discuss how your organisation can improve performance on supporting breastfeeding, do get in touch.
[1] https://www.unicef.org.uk/babyfriendly/about/breastfeeding-in-the-uk/
[2] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK148970/ ; https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9485728/
[3] https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/23/12678
[4] https://doughnuteconomics.org/about-doughnut-economics#what-is-the-doughnut
[5] https://unglobalcompact.org/what-is-gc ; https://unglobalcompact.org/what-is-gc/our-work/social
[6] https://centreforearlychildhood.org/
[7] https://ukbreastfeeding.org/wbtiuk2024/
[8] https://www.wbg.org.uk/publication/our-response-to-equality-race-and-disability-bill-consultation-on-mandatory-ethnicity-and-disability-pay-gap-reporting/
[9] https://ukbreastfeeding.org/wbtiuk2024/
[10] https://maternityaction.org.uk/2024/01/forced-to-return-early-the-impact-of-low-rates-of-maternity-pay/
[11] https://www.wbg.org.uk/article/gender-pay-gap-in-the-uk-2021/ ; https://www.reading.ac.uk/news/2025/Research-News/Study-finds-working-mothers-lack-breastfeeding-support
[12] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/000768139190005G?via%3Dihub
[13] https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Defining_the_G_in_ESG_2022.pdf
[14] https://ysph.yale.edu/news-article/experts-call-for-an-end-to-the-exploitative-marketing-used-by-the-baby-formula-milk-industry/