Break Free From Plastic identifies Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and Nestlé as world’s top plastic polluters again

08 Dec 2020 --- For the third consecutive year, Break Free From Plastics’ (BFFP) Brand Audit 2020 Report has named industry giants Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and Nestlé as the three most plastic polluting FMCG companies. 

Despite promises for change following BFFP’s previous audits, several companies were found to have increased waste.

The organization is now calling on governments to implement radical policies and collaborate on a global treaty against plastic pollution. 

In a special sub-report, BFFP is also drawing attention to the millions of waste pickers working worldwide to clean up the waste produced by these companies, the conditions they are forced to work in and the lack of opportunity caused by unrecyclable materials. 

Estelle Eonett, communications officer for BFFP, tells PackagingInsights: “With public opinion becoming more and more aware of the plastic pollution crisis, we will see a shift in consumer behavior, as well as in the kind of policy decision makers put in place, to mirror the wishes of their constituents.”

Usual suspects 
The top ten global polluters listed in the report are: Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Nestlé, Unilever, Mondelēz International, Mars, Procter & Gamble, Philip Morris International, Colgate-Palmolive and Perfetti Van Melle. 

Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and Nestlé have remained BFFP’s top three global polluters every year since its audits began in 2018. Unilever and Mondelēz International have been in the top five for two years in a row. 

“With new generations deeply invested in the protection of our environment, in order for companies to maintain consumer satisfaction, they will need to recognize the externalized costs of their products and put in place transparent and ambitious sustainability goals towards a circular economy,” says Eonett.

“The Brand Audit sheds light on the world’s biggest plastic polluters. It informs the general public of the brands that are trashing the environment with plastic waste and harming the health of communities.”

“If companies do not reveal, reduce and rethink their plastic packaging, the very survival of their business is at stake.”

Calling for solutions 
The report calls on the implicated corporations to “reveal, reduce and reinvent.”

That includes more transparency on waste created each year by item and weight; radically reducing plastic use according to clear targets; and generating and employing alternative, non-plastic packaging materials.Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and Nestlé have remained the top three worst polluters for three years in a row. 

Currently, BFFP alleges the corporations are attempting to subvert the calls for change by delaying governmental regulation, distracting the public from their role in the issue, and derailing legislation by lobbying against real solutions. 

“Impactful change at a large scale is possible if governments put strong regulations in place to reduce single-use plastic pollution,” asserts Eonett.

“Yet consumers and investors also have an essential role to play, by supporting companies with serious circular solutions and boycotting the biggest plastic polluters,” she adds. 

However, action must be taken on all sides, the report asserts. 

BFFP’s proposed legislation includes forcing companies to pay for collection services and waste treatment, ensuring all packaging is recycled in the country it was produced and levying taxes to incentivize innovations. 

Critically, a call for a global treaty on plastics, similar to that of the Montreal Protocol on chemicals, is made. This year, two thirds of UN member states approved such a treaty, but BFFP alleges major oil and gas producing nations are opposing it. 

Global data consensus
Almost 15,000 volunteers collected data in 55 countries to conduct 575 brand audits. Of the more than 346,000 plastic waste pieces collected, 63 percent was marked with a brand. 

Volunteers collected waste from public and private areas ranging from city streets and parks to residential homes; they then recorded data at the end of each week on brand names found, item descriptions, types of material and number of layers. 

Of the waste collected, over 203,000 pieces were food packaging, over 72,000 were smoking materials, and over 21,000 were household items like shampoo and detergent bottles. 

Crucially, 132,000 items were marked as unknown types of plastic, including sachets and cigarette butts. Nearly 82,000 were PET, such as beverage bottles, and almost 62,000 were polypropylene such as bottle caps and surgical masks. 

Waste pickers
Millions of people earning a living by picking up plastic waste have their livelihoods threatened by non-recyclable packaging. Millions of people earning a living by picking up plastic waste have their livelihoods threatened by non-recyclable packaging.

BFFP’s report has highlighted the often ignored area of workers associated with plastic waste in collaboration with waste picker groups. 

According to Women in Informal Employment: Globalizing and Organizing (WIEGO), a waste picker is anyone earning a living by collecting, sorting, recycling and selling materials that others have thrown away. 

Some are considered informal, and others are organized into collectives and unions. 

BFFP says the lack of action over plastic waste has disastrous consequences for the millions of people earning a living this way. 

“For years, corporations have been propagating the self-serving myth that plastic waste picking creates jobs for marginalized communities. But firsthand accounts from waste pickers expose a different reality,” the report reads. 

The majority of wasted packaging, such as sachets, has almost zero monetary value. While these packages are often marketed as “pro-poor” since they provide low cost products, this in turn reduces workers’ ability to earn from collecting them. 

Ironically, the report says, these same poor communities also bear the brunt of pollution caused by the packaging as it then remains uncollected and contaminates public places and water sources. 

The corporations respond
In response to the report’s findings and accusations, several companies issued comments. 

A spokesperson for Coca-Cola tells PackagingInsights: “In partnership with others, we are working to address this critical issue of packaging waste and making progress. Globally, we have a commitment to get every bottle back by 2030 so that none of it ends up as litter or in the oceans, and the plastic can be recycled into new bottles.”

“Bottles with 100 percent recycled plastic are now available in 18 markets worldwide, and this is continually growing. We’ve also reduced plastic use in secondary packaging and, across Europe, we are now using new paperboard technologies to hold can multipacks together without plastic.”

“For package-less options, globally, more than 20 percent of our portfolio comes in refillable or fountain packaging.”BFFP enlisted the help of 15,000 volunteers in 55 countries. 

A spokesperson at Nestlé gave the following response: “The latest ‘Break Free From Plastic’ Brand Audit 2020 Report highlights the continued challenges we face as a society in tackling the issue of plastic packaging waste. We know we have an essential role to play in shaping sustainable solutions to tackle the issue of plastics waste.” 

“We are intensifying our actions to make 100 percent of our packaging recyclable or reusable by 2025 and to reduce our use of virgin plastics by one-third in the same period. So far, 87 percent of our total packaging and 66 percent of our plastic packaging is recyclable or reusable.”

“While we are making meaningful progress in sustainable packaging, we know that more needs to be done. Our ambition is to create a circular economy in which we eliminate waste and reuse the resources we already have.”

A Unilever spokesperson says: “To tackle the root causes of plastic waste, we need to think differently about packaging. That’s why we are using more recycled plastic, developing reusable and refillable formats and switching to ‘no plastic’ solutions.”

“We continue to make progress on innovative changes that will help people cut their use of plastic for good. There’s more work to do, but we are fully committed to halving our use of virgin plastic by 2025.”

with additional reporting by Anni Schleicher

By Louis Gore-Langton