VEVEY (dpa-AFX) - Swiss food and beverage giant Nestle SA announced a $30 million investment in the U.S., as well as further global initiatives in its efforts to reduce the use of plastic, aiming for a waste-free future.
The company's actions are focused on making its complete packaging recyclable or reusable by 2025 and to reduce its use of virgin plastics by one-third during this period.
In the U.S., the planned $30 million investment from the company's sustainable packaging venture fund is to shift from virgin plastics and to increase the use of food-grade recycled plastics. It is expected that the increasing use of recycled plastics would help reduce carbon footprint, in line with the firm's stated aim to achieve zero net greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
The latest investment, in the Closed Loop Leadership Fund, is the first to utilize Nestle's packaging venture fund established earlier this year. It is part of the company's overall investment of up to 2 billion Swiss francs for sustainable packaging solutions.
Further, the company is planning a refillable system for pet food in Chile and first-of-its-kind recyclable paper packaging for Maggi bouillon cubes in France.
As of now, 87 percent of its packaging is already recyclable or reusable, Nestle said. Based on its three-pillar approach launched in January 2019, Nestle continues to solve the issue of plastic pollution.
The company is also launching Nestle Creating Shared Value or CSV Prize on September 30, looking for innovative solutions. The Nestle CSV Prize, in partnership with the non-profit organization Ashoka, will award 250 thousand francs in grants for system change innovations in areas including alternative delivery systems and ground-up solutions to tackle plastic waste.
In February, NextGen Consortium, in which Nestlé is a supporting partner, announced the launch of reusable cup pilots in local cafes in the City of San Francisco and City of Palo Alto, California. The multi-year consortium focuses to address single-use food packaging waste by advancing reusable, recyclable and/or compostable food packaging alternatives.
Consumer goods major Unilever recently announced its plan to create biodegradable and water-efficient product formulations to halve the use of virgin plastic by 2025.
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