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go through Zidi Ramogas
At Coca-Cola Beverages Africa (CCBA), our sustainability strategy puts people – consumers and employees – at the centre, driving sustainable solutions that build resilience in our business to meet current and future challenges, while creating positive change for the planet.
Water is a top priority for the Coca-Cola system as it is the first ingredient in all of our beverages and is vital to the communities we serve.
The Coca-Cola Company’s 2030 Water Security Strategy is committed to improving water security. We work with partners to provide a stable supply of clean water to people and ecosystems in the regions where we operate and source our ingredients.
We improve livelihoods and well-being by providing sustainable access to clean water, while preventing water-related disasters.
We are committed to using recycled water throughout our operations. This means reducing water usage and reusing and treating wastewater.
For example, in Kenya, we opened a new wastewater treatment plant at our Equator Bottlers factory in Kisumu, which will promote more sustainable water use and help reduce the factory’s environmental impact. The new plant will enable us to treat and recycle wastewater from our production facilities, which will be used for non-potable purposes such as irrigation and cleaning.
Our subsidiary, Coca-Cola Beverages Botswana, signed an agreement last year with the University of Agriculture and Natural Resources of Botswana to donate water from its newly installed water treatment plant for agricultural irrigation on campus. The new state-of-the-art water treatment plant ensures clean water is returned to the environment, bringing the company into full compliance with effluent discharge standards.
For our packaging, we seek to advance the circular economy as it helps reduce waste and carbon emissions. We are working to use more recycled materials in our packaging, expand the use of refillable bottles, and collect packaging for recycling through Coca-Cola’s World Without Waste program. We are also working with partners to design new packaging solutions.
For example, in 2004, Coca-Cola Company, in collaboration with other like-minded industries, established the PET Recycling Company (PETCO) in South Africa, which is dedicated to promoting and regulating the recycling of PET plastics and is responsible for the recovery and reuse of beverage PET plastic bottles.
The PETCO model has proven so effective that it has now expanded to three other markets, Kenya, Tanzania and Ethiopia, with plans to include other countries, including Namibia.
As we work towards our own progress, we are also committed to building partnerships to drive collective impact in areas such as water stewardship, packaging circularity, climate action and more.
We engage with stakeholders in a variety of forums and formats, including governments, non-governmental organizations, communities, suppliers, business partners, customers and consumers in the markets where we operate. Stakeholder feedback enables us to learn and improve, and informs our business and sustainability strategies.
About the author:
Tshidi Ramogase is Chief Public Affairs, Communications and Sustainability Officer at CCBA.
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