CONTEXT: CLIMATE RISKS AND OUR SECTOR'S RESPONSIBILITY IN ADDRESSING THEM
Climate risks are increasing, and the impacts of related extreme weather and drought in Europe are evident.
There is no doubt that if we are to realise the ambition to meet the Paris Climate Agreement and the UN Sustainable Development Goals, we need to proactively innovate and improve our ways of doing business so we can address this challenge and meet the expectations of our consumers.
Our sector acknowledges its responsibility in playing its part in the fight against climate change and we are committed to help the European Union become a climate neutral continent by 2050 by driving decarbonisation throughout our value chain – from responsible sourcing of our ingredients to production and distribution of the final products. We know our competitiveness and long term success depend on the sustainability of our operations and the resilience of our value chain.
OUR SECTOR'S ENGAGEMENT AND ACTIONS
UNESDA members have robust science-based net zero targets in place (with deadlines ranging from 2040 to 2050) or are in the final steps of setting those. They have focused on reducing their environmental footprint over many years, with investments resulting in the reduction (and reuse, when applicable) of energy, carbon emissions, water and raw materials as well as actions to protect nature and reverse the degradation of ecosystems. Our sector is also continuously working to improve the sustainability of its packaging through packaging reduction, collection, recycling, reuse and refill.
Our actions to reduce our climate impacts focus on the following three key areas:
1. Reducing our carbon footprint
- Our sector operates state-of-the-art production and bottling facilities which offer some of the most advanced, low energy solutions in production, and it is continuously upgrading and optimising equipment and systems to reduce its carbon footprint.
- Many of our companies have set ambitious climate goals for their entire value chain (including net zero ambitions, in line with or faster than the EU targets) and have increased the use of renewable and clean energy in operations and encouraged suppliers to do the same across their value chains.
- We have also invested in significant light-weighting and design initiatives across our packaging formats. This has reduced the amount of raw materials used in our packaging and meant that they require less fuel to transport and generate fewer CO2 emissions.
- We are also working on reducing the carbon emissions of our logistics and distribution: avoiding vehicles driving empty, shifting from road to rail, improving our distribution network to reduce movements, working with logistics providers on the shift to alternative fuels, etc.
2. Making our packaging more sustainable
- Designing circular packaging:
- The soft drinks sector has been making significant investments to only use packaging that is circular by design. A majority of UNESDA corporate members have either already achieved our objective of 100% recyclability or are very close (some having progressed to 99% between 2022 and 2023).
- UNESDA is a founding member of the European PET Bottle Platform (EPBP), the voluntary initiative that aims to ensure recyclability by evaluating PET design, production, and recycling technologies.
- UNESDA is also a founding member of several cross-sectoral initiatives to support and promote further circularity in beverage packaging, including the “Close the Glass Loop” initiative — to increase glass bottle recycling — and the International Aluminium Institute’s Call to accelerate Aluminium Beverage Can Circularity — to encourage even greater collection and recycling of aluminium beverage cans.
- Improving the collection of soft drinks packaging:
- The sector has been instrumental in setting up and running packaging collection schemes across the EU, and beverage PET bottles and aluminium cans are now one of the most recycled items across the continent.
- In particular, UNESDA members have been substantially involved in the establishment of Deposit and Return Systems (DRS) in the majority of European countries as one of the most effective ways to boost collection rates of beverage packaging. Together with the NGO community, UNESDA continues to advocate for a wider roll-out of DRS in Europe, as well as the development of minimum requirements for DRS to ensure these systems are set up and run in the most effective and cost-efficient way.
- Increasing closed-loop recycling of soft drinks packaging:
- The soft drinks sector is highly committed to boosting the uptake of recycled content in its packaging. In 2023, an average of 39.6% of the PET used in the manufacturing of our plastic bottles was recycled PET. The same year, over 76% of aluminium beverage cans were recycled in the European Union.
- UNESDA has joined forces with the NGO community to advocate for a well-functioning market for secondary raw materials that provides fair access to sufficient food-grade feedstock for recycling to enable closed-loop recycling.
- We are committed to giving our valuable packaging a new life, turning our bottles into new bottles and our cans into new cans through high-quality recycling, which is critical to help drive down the carbon footprint of our packaging.
- Providing a range of complementary packaging solutions and beverage systems, based on recycling, reuse and refill:
- UNESDA is committed to using more reusable packaging and systems enabling refill but also studying the best environmental and economic pathways to increase the use of reusable and refillable models and ensuring that reuse and recycling systems are designed to complement each other, making sure that important environmental benefits of both systems are fully realised.
- To provide insights into the investments and changes required to increase the rate of reuse, UNESDA commissioned an economic study on returnable refillable PET bottles from PwC, which was finalised in 2021.
- UNESDA corporate members have also started increasing their offer of recyclable, reusable and refill solutions and are committed to further exploring package-less solutions to bring more systems for refill (such as at-home dispensers) on the European market.
3. Addressing the growing threat of depleting water resources
- UNESDA members recognise the value of water. It is a key resource for non-alcoholic beverages and is critical to ensuring a sustainable supply of the agricultural ingredients we depend on.
- We work hard to promote efficient water use (both agricultural and in our production processes) and we work with local partners on water replenishment programmes to return water to nature and communities.
- We understand that water is a local issue and the action we take must address the needs of the local watersheds where we operate and source our ingredients.
- Our water stewardship aims to protect and restore watersheds to conserve water resources. We do this by continuously working to improve water efficiency by reducing the amount of water used in production, and by optimising water use by reusing and recycling water as much as possible.
- We welcome the increased policy attention for water stewardship and the importance of nature-based solutions, which include water replenishment programmes. Our sector stands ready to work with the EU Commission on the Water Resilience Initiative to advance this agenda.
What else is needed: our call for action
Reaching our climate objectives will require a wholesale change. We know we all need to work together to achieve fully circular systems for our packaging, a fully green grid and a shift to non-fossil fuels in Europe. And for this, we need the support of policymakers. This is why we want to be part of the discussion on how we can collectively make progress towards meeting the EU’s climate objectives, including finalising the 2040 Climate target.
Indeed, we believe it is critical for businesses, communities and our planet that the EU sets a robust 2040 GHG emissions reduction target. The Green Deal is the right direction of travel but it is imperative that we set an ambitious 2040 target, enshrined in the European Climate Law, to move from ambition to action on the long-term (including the 2030-2040 decade).
In this context, we support Commission’s President Von der Leyen’s plans to decarbonise, to keep building a more circular and resilient economy, to support Member States on climate preparedness and water security by ensuring sources are properly managed and scarcity is addressed, and to help European firms to embrace the green transition in a way that encourages and improves European competitiveness and competition within the single market. We are indeed pleased to read that Europe aims to stay on course on the goals set out in the Green Deal. The Clean Industrial Deal expected within the first 100 days of the new Commission will be a big support in helping us prepare for the 2040 target.
We are looking forward to collaborating with the European Commission and other decision-makers on an environmental regulatory framework which enables businesses to drive ambitious transformations.
We also appreciate the EU is looking to lead on international climate advocacy, which will support our sector’s value chain decarbonisation due to the global nature of some of our members.