Danone is engaged on SDG 14 as a commitment
According to World Economic Forum New Plastics Economy report, 40 percent of the plastic used worldwide is still disposed of in landfill. Approximately 10–20 million tons of plastic a year end up in the oceans with all the negative impacts on marine biodiversity that it can cause. This is an unsustainable impact for packaging and great efforts worldwide are already underway to close that loop.
We strive to be a game-changer to foster positive solutions for the planet. We commit to enhance the circular economy of packaging and more specifically of plastic. Packaging has become part of life and every day, billions of products are stored, transported and used safely and easily thanks to the packaging designed to protect products. But packaging also uses valuable resources and can generate waste when not recycled.
Danone has committed to take its part and Danone’s Packaging Policy, published in 2016, reaffirmed our ambition to “co-build the packaging circular economy by sourcing sustainable materials and creating a second life for all plastics.” In 2018, we updated our policy to reflect the progress we have made and set out how we will accelerate our journey, supporting the global transition to the circular economy of packaging.
Our strategy is to promote the circular economy of packaging by supporting the development of processes and systems that turn waste into resources. To do so, we built our strategy around 3 pillars:
- “Packaging designed for circularity”: Initiatives to improve product design and develop alternative delivery and reuse models (target: Use 100% reusable, recyclable or compostable packaging by 2025).
- “Reused, Recycled or Composted in practice”: Investments to develop effective, efficient and inclusive systems for increased collection and recycling, and to boost recycling (target: Initiate or support collection and recycling initiatives in each of our top 20 markets by 2025)
- “Preservation of natural resources”: Actions to preserve natural resources by reintegrating recycled materials into our packaging and developing use of renewable materials (targets: 50% recycled material in average for our water and beverage bottles by 2025; offer consumers bottles made of 100% renewable plastic (bioPET) by 2025).
For more information, see our Packaging Policy.
Danone is co-creating dedicated initiatives with relevant stakeholders at local level (such as governments, peers, waste-pickers and waste professionals) and international level (funding organizations and NGOs involved in fostering circular economy and preventing marine littering such as the Ocean Conservancy or the Ellen MacArthur Foundation) to launch scalable ‘packaging second-life’ initiatives. In 2018, Danone signed the New Plastics Economy Global Commitment led by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, in collaboration with UN Environment, and participated to the “Our Ocean Conference” in Bali.