Target 12.8: Information and awareness for sustainable lifestyles
By 2030, ensure that people everywhere have the relevant information and awareness for sustainable development and lifestyles in harmony with nature
Owners voting their values help. Others must carry most of it.
Why shareholder democracy is helpful
Public awareness is shaped by education systems, but corporate marketing is a major information channel and often misleading. A January 2021 European Commission website sweep found that half of the online green claims it screened lacked evidence. InfluenceMap found that 60 percent of the 3,421 public communications put out in 2021 by BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil, Shell and TotalEnergies contained a green claim. Those five companies spent roughly 750 million dollars a year on climate-related messaging. Shareholder votes on marketing claims and lobbying transparency help at the margin.
How this was scoredHelpful
Helpful. Owners voting their values help. Others must carry most of it.
We have not yet written down the two answers behind this rating. Recording them on every item, so a reader can check the reasoning and not only the conclusion, is work in progress.
Every rating is the higher of two answers, one for what companies do and one for what they spend to stop the outcome, because the same vote reaches both. See the full method.
Sources
1 campaign on record
Provide accurate recyclability information for plastic cups and disclose details on the transition to reusable cups.
Result: withdrawn after company agreement
Starbucks agreed to ensure it provides accurate recyclability information and to share details about its transition to reusable cups by early 2026.
Our Top Ten Victories from the 2025 Shareholder Advocacy Season, Green Century
How this rating was made
Every item on every one of our maps is read against one question: how far does this depend on the people who own companies voting their values? We answer it twice, once for what companies do and once for what they spend to stop the outcome, and take whichever answer is higher, since the same vote reaches both. The score carries its reasoning and its sources so that a reader can check it rather than take it.
- Pivotal. Owners voting their values can deliver most of the outcome.
- Necessary. Owners remove an obstacle nothing else removes, and others must also act.
- Helpful. Owners voting their values help, and others carry most of it.
- Independent. This moves without owners. Other levers carry it.
The advocacy record on this page holds only what a source we opened says happened. Where we searched and found nothing, the page says so rather than leaving a silence. Where a campaign names a filer the source does not name, it says that too. Ratings are ours; the list of subjects is UN Sustainable Development Goals's, and we link to their original.
How we score dependency, in full.