Earth Day is an opportunity to highlight our commitments, challenges and achievements toward a more sustainable future. At PepsiCo, we know that no resource is as critical to our planet as water. We also know that a healthy watershed provides a reliable water supply for use by business, community and agriculture. Last week, the World Business Council for Sustainable Development’s water leadership group launched “Sharing Water, Engaging Business,” a report highlighting the business case for local engagement and collaboration. The report is a key deliverable of the leadership group’s water stewardship pathway, which is led by PepsiCo. By describing the important functions that watersheds perform – from filtering runoff to absorbing flood waters to recharging groundwater reserves – the report makes the case for business involvement... Read more

The theme of this year’s World Water Week in Stockholm is Water and Food Security, so discussions of PepsiCo’s work to conserve resources in agriculture are front and center. On Monday, PepsiCo and the Columbia Water Center (CWC) at the Earth Institute, Columbia University convened a panel titled Water and Energy Efficiencies in Food Supply Chains: Leveraging Partnerships.  We started the discussion by describing PepsiCo’s ReCon program, which focuses on identifying, quantifying, and prioritizing opportunities to conserve resources in our operating plants. We then devoted most of the session to the conservation challenges and opportunities in our agriculture supply chain. Ian Hope-Johnstone, director of agricultural sustainability, described the actions PepsiCo and our partners have taken to improve India’s potato productivity while using less water; our collaboration with the Inter-American Development Bank in supporting Mexican sunflower farmers; and i-crop, a system that allows integrated management of water, nutrient, and crop... Read more

In recognition of PEP’s commitment to respect the human right to water and our recent report on the Positive Water Impact initiative, the Swedish Water House invited me to speak on the complementary roles of governments and companies with respect to water. The setting was the Kulturhuset in Stockholm, an open setting where coffee shops, libraries, displays and seating areas flow together. The seminar was part of a two-day series of discussions, films and presentations on the broader topic of human rights. Daniel Yeo of WaterAid and I had a 30-minute discussion of what PepsiCo has achieved, what challenges we’ve faced, and what lies ahead. I was happy to share news about PepsiCo Foundation’s recent commitment to Water.org ($8 million dollars to help provide access to safe water for 800,000 people through WaterCredit). Ensuring access to clean water is critical to the success and sustainability of our business, and to the communities in which PepsiCo operates. Working with partners like Water.org, Safe Water Network and Columbia University’s Earth Institute is instrumental in our commitment to global water stewardship. Read more

Along with Dan Bena of PepsiCo global operations and Claire Lyons of the PepsiCo Foundation, I recently attended World Water Week in Stockholm. This conference has been an annual event since 1991 and brings together NGOs, governments, researchers, and companies from around the world. This year, over 100 countries Afghanistan to Zimbabwe were represented. Many of the alliances in which PepsiCo participates, including the Water Footprint Network, the UN CEO Water Mandate, and the World Business Council on Sustainable Development’s water leadership group, met during the week to share information and report on group initiatives. Read more

We are proud to announce that PepsiCo and The Nature Conservancy (TNC) have just finished the first phase of a joint Positive Water Impact study. By Positive Water Impact, we mean making more and better water available to the environment and the communities where we and our suppliers operate. The focus is local, at the watershed level. For a global company like PepsiCo it means coming up with solutions for every area where we operate, from our bottling facility in Zhanjiang, China to our snack and beverage plants in Mexico City. Read more

I recently returned from the Global Water Summit in Berlin, Germany, where I’d spent two days with more than 400 water experts from the public and private sectors and engaging in lively discussions about corporate water stewardship and performance. The conference was a great opportunity to share best practices with experts from across the world, including other corporations, academics journalists and politicians. During the summit, I participated in a panel discussion about the value of water footprinting – defined as “the total volume of fresh water used to produce the goods and services produced by a business.” One of my fellow panelists, Dr. Ashok Chapagain from the WWF, stated that a stand-alone water footprint number would be of little use to consumers without a veritable bible of supporting information.  Other panelists echoed the observation, including Marcus Norton, head of Carbon Disclosure Project Water Disclosure, an organization... Read more

I recently returned from the Solutions for Sustainable Water Use conference in Brussels, where I had the opportunity to share best practices and learn about different approaches to water stewardship from our peers in the beverage industry, EU officials, academics and non-governmental organizations (NGOs). The event was organized by the Inter-Press Service and Global Compact Network, supported by Anheuser-Busch InBev. The central theme that emerged at the conference was supply-chain water challenges – a top-of-mind issue for the beverage industry and PepsiCo. Iris Van der Veken, Chair of Global Compact Network Belgium, and Karl Falkenberg, Director General of Environment for the European Commission, focused on the human right to water and how it will become more difficult – and expensive – to guarantee this right in the future. At PepsiCo, we recognize this challenge and are planning for the growing global population who will put even... Read more