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Coca-Cola Enterprises Responds to Obesity Concerns, Sets Most Ambitious Sustainability Targets to Date

Coca-Cola Enterprises (CCE) published its tenth annual Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability report this week, in which it set its most ambitious environmental and social targets to date.The new commitments include:

By Brynn McNally | Published 10 years ago | About a 3 minute read

Coca-Cola Enterprises (CCE) published its tenth annual Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability report this week, in which it set its most ambitious environmental and social targets to date.

The new commitments include:

Reducing calories per liter across CCE’s entire portfolio by 10 percent by 2020;
Halving the carbon footprint of its business by 2020;
Ensuring that 40 percent of the Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) it uses is recycled PET and/or PET from renewable materials by 2020;
Supporting the skills development and learning needs of 250,000 young people every year.

The report’s emphasis on health and well-being follows growing consumer concerns over calorie intake and obesity. It also commits CCE to encouraging people to be physically active, targeting three million people across its territories by 2020.

*“*Our new commitments have been heavily shaped by the expectations of our stakeholders – we listened, and their feedback has helped us set new and more challenging goals, particularly around well-being and carbon. This isn’t just another report – it’s a milestone and an opportunity to make a real difference,” said Joe Franses, Director of Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability for CCE.

In addition, CCE’s new environmental targets could advance the company’s goal to be a sustainability leader. Its new report highlights notable achievements over the last year: including reducing its carbon footprint 29 percent in absolute terms since 2007, and using a record level of recycled PET, representing a third of all its PET volume.

“Our new commitments embrace both environmental and social issues – with a stronger focus than ever before on promoting the well-being of our consumers,” said John F. Brock, Chairman and CEO of Coca-Cola Enterprises. “If we want to build a long-term, sustainable business, there’s no room for complacency, and these ambitious targets reflect our desire to take a lead in our industry when it comes to sustainability.”

CCE’s focus on combating obesity is another sign of this issue’s relevance to major consumer brands. The Coca-Cola Company announced its “Happiness is Movement” campaign in 2013, and committed to offer low of no-calorie beverage options and transparent nutrition information in every market where its products are offered. Also in 2013, Nestl****é committed to fight obesity by offering portion guidance on children’s products and label daily guideline amounts, and earlier this year pledged to remove all artificial flavors and colors from its chocolate candy by the end of 2015. And last month Mars announced it would both endorse recommendations from leading global health authorities that people should limit their intake of added sugars to no more than 10 percent of their total calorie intake, and support a new US Government proposal to include an “added sugars” declaration in the Nutrition Facts panel on all food packaging.