Retail Decarbonisation Is Our Biggest Sustainability Challenge: Titan CSO
When sustainability is discussed, the focus often falls on hard-to-abate sectors such as steel, cement, power and oil and gas, where decarbonisation presents some of the biggest challenges. Consumer-facing companies receive comparatively less attention, even though their environmental and social footprint extends across sourcing, manufacturing, retail operations and extensive supplier networks.For companies like Titan, sustainability is increasingly becoming part of how products are sourced, manufactured and sold, while also shaping relationships with employees, communities and supply chain partners. In a virtual interaction with BW Businessworld, N E Sridhar, Chief Sustainability Officer, Titan Company, spoke about the company's sustainability philosophy, responsible sourcing, decarbonisation challenges and the role of its ESG roadmap, Pragati, in embedding sustainability across the business. Edited excerpts:
How is Titan integrating sustainability into its long-term business strategy across different brands?
When we use the word sustainability today, most people think only about climate and the environment. But sustainability has always been about the triple bottom line, people, planet and profits. That philosophy has guided Titan from the beginning and continues through our ESG strategy, Pragati.
On the social side, we built our manufacturing ecosystem by recruiting local communities, underprivileged girls and persons with disabilities, and training them to become skilled watchmakers and jewellery artisans. For more than three decades, our women's self-help groups in Hosur have become part of our supply chain. Similar models exist through our Karigar Centres for jewellery and Weaver Shalas for Tanera.
The environment has also been part of our business from our manufacturing days. We continue to expand renewable energy and resource efficiency across our operations. During FY2025-26, we sourced 26.83 million kWh of renewable energy for our factories and corporate offices. Titan has traditionally entered sectors that were unorganised and underserved, whether watches, jewellery, eyewear or handloom sarees. In each case, the effort has been to organise value chains while creating sustainable livelihoods alongside business growth.
The jewellery and watch industries have complex supply chains. What are the biggest sustainability challenges in ensuring responsible raw material sourcing, and how is Titan addressing them?
This challenge is most significant in jewellery. We source diamonds and precious stones only from certified and licensed suppliers. Our gold is purchased through licensed banks, and around 40 per cent to 42 per cent of the gold we use today is recycled gold brought back by customers exchanging older jewellery. We started this circular approach long before it became part of the broader national conversation.
Although Titan is an organised jewellery retailer, the wider industry remains largely unorganised. There is still considerable work to bring more supply chain partners into responsible manufacturing and sourcing practices. We have introduced several measures to improve transparency, including the Caratmeter for gold purity and in-store diamond authenticity verification. The same focus on genuine products extends across Helios, our eyewear business and Tanera.
For jewellery, which contributes nearly 80 per cent to 85 per cent of our business, we follow a structured 4P framework covering People, Process, Planet and Place. The programme helps strengthen responsible sourcing, safety and sustainability practices while supporting vendors as they progress from cottage and basic operations to advanced and world-class standards. Under Pragati, we aim to expand this framework across a larger share of our domestic production by FY30.
Consumers are now more conscious of environmental and social impacts. How has this shift influenced Titan's operations and sustainability investments?
Our sustainability journey has evolved into Pragati, which brings together our priorities across environment, social impact, governance and partner responsibility. We have committed ourselves to clear environmental goals, including Net Zero for Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions and reducing plastic use by FY30. On the social side, we aim to reach 2.5 million people through our CSR programmes. Last year alone, these initiatives reached more than 900,000 people. One of our largest programmes is girl child education, where we currently support nearly 65,000 girls. This is a conscious choice because women form the backbone of our business across jewellery, watches and eyewear.
At the same time, we do not believe sustainability should become transactional. We do not ask customers to contribute extra money at the billing counter to support social causes. These initiatives are our responsibility. Consumers increasingly recognise companies that build products with a sense of responsibility, and that trust becomes part of the brand.
What are the biggest challenges in achieving Titan's decarbonisation goals?
Sustainability at Titan is driven from the board level. Every major ESG goal has clear ownership within the leadership team, which allows us to move from commitments to execution. The biggest challenge today is not manufacturing. Most of our factories already operate with high renewable energy usage. The more difficult task is decarbonising our retail network of more than 3,000 stores spread across malls and standalone locations, where renewable energy solutions are more complex. We are working with technology partners to address this.
Packaging is another area where we are pursuing alternatives as part of our plastic reduction targets. Water has been another important priority. Although our original target was to become Water Positive by FY30, we achieved that milestone ahead of schedule during FY2025-26 with a Net Water Ratio of 1.65. This has been supported by internal water efficiency measures as well as lake rejuvenation and water conservation projects undertaken with local authorities. These investments are not driven by immediate business returns. They are driven by the belief that industry must coexist with society and the environment.
What will be the defining sustainability trend for the consumer goods sector over the next three to five years, and where does Titan stand?
The biggest trend will be recognising that sustainability cannot focus on only one area. Businesses must balance people, planet and profits together.
Companies are increasingly investing not only in communities but also in environmental restoration. Governance and transparency will also become much more important as reporting standards continue to evolve.
Consumers are becoming more conscious. They expect responsible sourcing, lower packaging waste and greater accountability from brands. The same shift is visible among young professionals, who increasingly ask about a company's sustainability commitments before they decide to join it.
For us, sustainability is about building a responsible business across the entire value chain. That remains the direction of our journey.
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