In a global live online conference yesterday, Nestle announced that it had created a ‘roadmap’ to bring its net greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2050.
The plan called the ‘Nestlé Net Zero Roadmap’ announced the multi-national company’s commitment to being carbon neutral in a live event called the ‘Nestlé Net Zero Roadmap Global Live Event.’
The food and beverage giant will spend Swiss francs CHF 3.2 billion ($3.58 billion) over the next five years to halve its absolute emissions by 2030 and bring them to net-zero by 2050.
The global conference began by explaining the threat that global warming may have on food security and agricultural economies worldwide.
“We must act now to protect the planet, to protect the livelihoods of the farmers upon whom we rely on the ingredients that we need, to protect the resilience of the food system upon which we all depend,” it was said at the conference, “By 2050, the temperature change will affect seasons creating stronger floods and droughts and affecting the way crops are grown.”
The first multi-national company to pledge to Pathway of the Paris Agreement
Nestle was the first to pledge for UN’s 1.5 degrees Pathway of the Paris Agreement in September 2019 with the ambition to come up with a plan in lesser time than the required 2 years.
Talking about expenditures, Mark Schneider, the company’s CEO, announced, “We expect over the next 5 years to invest an amount of about 3.2 billion Swiss francs. 1.2 out of those 3.2 billion Swiss francs, we specifically earmarked for regenerative agricultural practices, which will be a key component in our road to net-zero. Then there is 2 billion spread out over several of our items, particularly the use of renewable energy. Most of that spending will come in the form of operational expenditure.”
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To achieve this, Nestle is currently working with farmers and suppliers to implement such practices, and their focus on agriculture will improve soil health and biodiversity. The regenerative agricultural practices will produce 14 million tons of ingredients by 2030. For its reforestation program, Nestle is focused on growing 200 million trees by 2030.
In September 2020, Nestlé Pakistan announced its partnership with the National Institute of Food Science and Technology, University of Agriculture (NIFSAT – UAF) to focus on capacity building and enhanced development of the agriculture sector and food science technology
In an interview with the Business Recorder, the CEO of Nestle Pakistan, Samer Chedid, said that “We all know that agriculture contributes substantially to greenhouse gas emissions in Pakistan, mostly through livestock. Increasing the yield per animal will improve the carbon footprint of the sector. This means you can have the same or even more quantity of milk with lesser animals.”
Beyond reducing our greenhouse gas emissions, there is enormous potential to remove gases from the atmosphere by harnessing nature’s own solutions. 🌳🌎🌲
Learn more: https://t.co/UewFGviQmi #ClimateAction #Nestlé #NetZero pic.twitter.com/bVBxnMx1Bo— Nestlé (@Nestle) December 4, 2020
He was talking about Nestle’s contributions in reducing its carbon impact; he continued in the same interview,” When you move into a more formal channel and more organized farms, you can educate farmers about good practices across the value chain. However, as long as we remain in the informal and fragmented farming way, it becomes difficult to manage and improve, even though we have many interventions as a company. As an industry, I have to say; there has been more than Rs500 million investment in developing rural farming, which will take time. But if you have a different approach, you could accelerate the process.”
Nestle’s achievements in the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions
Nestle spends around 1.5 billion Swiss francs on research & development each year.
Talking about their achievements so far in the conference yesterday, Nestle global company stated that, “We have already made good progress in reducing our greenhouse gas emissions over the past decade, for example, since 2014 the reduction of greenhouse gases across all our value chains is equivalent to taking 1.2 million cars off the road and over the past 10 years we have cut by more than 1/3 of our emissions of every kilo of nestle product produced in our factories.”
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The company further announced that 40% of their factories are already using 100% renewable electricity with more to come and 66 percent of the company’s plastic packaging is already today recyclable or reusable.”
Nestle’s in-scope GHG emissions total 92 million tonnes of CO2e with operations, including sourcing ingredients, manufacturing products, packaging products, managing logistics, and travel and employee commuting.
GVS News Desk