Britvic recognised as one of top global companies working with suppliers to tackle climate change
Britvic has been recognised for the actions it is taking to understand and tackle climate change, work that has seen it engage with more than 300 of its suppliers around the world. In a recent CDP report, the company is recognised as a Supplier Engagement Leader and ranked in the top 7% of international companies working with suppliers to combat climate change, based on 2020 CDP disclosures.
CDP (formerly the Carbon Disclosure Project), a gold standard in environmental reporting, received responses from more than 9,600 companies in 2020. Companies who provided full disclosure on climate received a Supplier Engagement Rating, with the top 7% recognised as Supplier Engagement Leaders.
The rating indicates how effectively companies are engaging their suppliers on climate change.
Sarah Webster, Director of Sustainable Business at Britvic, said: “Britvic puts people and planet on parity with performance and it’s great to see the work we’ve been doing recognised in today’s report. Being efficient with our resources, whether that’s water, packaging or energy, benefits the environment and makes us a more efficient business – increasing our competitiveness and resilience.
“We know we can’t tackle climate change alone and working with our supply chain to understand our impacts and what we can do to combat the climate crisis is critical.”
Sonya Bhonsle, Global Head of Value Chains at CDP, said: “Companies’ emissions don’t end at the factory door. In fact, CDP data shows a company’s supply chain emissions are over 11.4 times greater than its direct emissions on average. Meaningful corporate climate action means engaging with suppliers to reduce emissions across the value chain. Despite the challenges from COVID-19, in 2020 nearly 400 companies achieved a place on CDP’s Supplier Engagement Leaderboard.
“Congratulations to these companies – as Supplier Engagement Leaders, they are driving the transition towards the net-zero sustainable economy.”
Britvic’s ongoing work to tackle the climate crisis and reduce its emissions saw it complete a comprehensive value chain analysis, engaging with more than 300 suppliers in Great Britain, Ireland, France, Brazil and internationally.
The data gathered allowed Britvic to set ambitious carbon reduction targets and, in December 2019, as world leaders met for the UN Climate Change Conference in Madrid (COP25), Britvic’s targets were independently verified by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), showing that they are in line with what the latest climate science says is needed to prevent a global temperature rise of more than 1.5°C and avoid the worst impacts of climate change.
This announcement made Britvic the first UK soft drinks company to have an approved 1.5°C target.
Britvic is committed to reducing its Scope 1 and Scope 2 carbon emissions by 50%, reducing Scope 3 emissions by 35% by 20251, and will be carbon-neutral by 2050.
The company continues to light-weight its packaging, reducing resources used and cutting carbon emissions.
Since 2017 it has saved more than 2,000 tonnes of virgin plastic through packaging redesign. Every year Britvic saves 8,000 tonnes of packaging, having switched its cans from steel to lighter aluminium in 2018.
Last year Britvic announced its ambition to use 100% recycled plastic (rPET) bottles in Great Britain by the end of 2022, surpassing its original target of 50% rPET by 2025. Britvic has shared information with the CDP for the past decade and, in 2020, Britvic provided full disclosures on climate and water.
