Southern Co-op to stop selling disposable barbecues amid fire risk and environmental fears

Southern Co-Op, whose headquarters are at Lakeside, North Harbour in Portsmouth, has removed disposable barbecues from sale in all its convenience stores.

The announcement comes as the retailer work towards protecting the environment following fire risks caused by dry weather conditions.

Mark Smith, chief executive said: ‘We have a longstanding commitment to reduce our impact on the environment.

‘We’ve taken this additional step, to completely remove disposable barbecues from sale in all our 199 managed stores, to play our part in addressing the impacts of the extraordinarily dry conditions across the south.

‘We hope our members and customers will support this move to protect our local wildlife and ecosystems.’

Souther Co-op have a long-term climate change strategy to cut carbon emissions to ‘as low as they possibly can’ by 2025.

Between 2012 and 2019, the firm reduced its business carbon footprint by 27 per cent.