Coca-Cola, sponsor of COP27, is the company that pollutes the most

Coca-Cola, one of the sponsors of the COP27 climate summit held in Egypt, is the most polluting company due to its plastic packaging for the fifth year in a row, with the number of waste reaching 3.2 million tons, the environmental organization Greenpeace denounced, today, Tuesday.

“Over five years, more plastic containers have been collected from Coca-Cola than the second and third most polluting companies combined,” the environmentalists said in a statement.

This year, audits of the organized collection of plastic trash showed that the number of containers of Coca-Cola products found doubled compared to 2018.

“For the fifth year in a row, Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and Nestlé have once again ranked the companies that pollute the most with their plastic packaging,” according to the latest brand audit conducted worldwide by Break Free From Plastic. (Free yourself from plastic), the environmental report added.

According to the statement, 3.2 million tons of plastic are collected annually from Coca-Cola, while Pepsico collects 2.5 million tons of waste annually.

Switzerland’s Nestle produces 920,000 tons, despite the food company’s commitment to reducing the total weight of plastic packaging by 2025.

Ornela Garelli, a specialist in responsible consumption and climate change from Greenpeace Mexico, states that “Coca-Cola is fighting against efforts to combat plastic pollution, such as the ban on single-use plastics” in countries like Mexico.

Environmental organizations are calling on companies such as Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Nestlé and Unilever to end the use of disposable plastic, to ensure that at least half of their packaging is reused by 2030.

For Garelli, the way to confront the crisis is for the biggest polluters to promote a “Global Plastics Treaty” that has “binding mechanisms” to reduce the production and use of plastic and accelerate a just transition to a reuse economy. .

“Our societies are suffering while the most polluting corporations and major oil companies dramatically increase plastic production to obtain economic benefits,” the environmental scientist added in a written statement, according to Sputnik.

Since 2018, more than 200,000 volunteers in 87 countries and territories have conducted clean-up or trash-collection activities that have led to brand audits to identify companies that pollute the most with their plastic packaging.

These results were released at the same time that Coca-Cola, the most polluting company, is also a sponsor of the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP27) being held in Egypt.

“99% of plastic comes from fossil fuels, so Coca-Cola’s role in COP27 baffles environmental activists,” Greenpeace explained.

In response to the companies’ inaction, activists planned a “Trashiversary,” a protest that involved handing over their trash to the responsible companies, asking them to take urgent action to reduce their pollution.

These actions will take place on November 16 and will be directed at Coca-Cola in Argentina, Bangladesh, Brazil, Congo, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, the United States and Zambia. Unilever in Indonesia, the UK and South Africa; and PepsiCo in India and Tanzania.

The Global Plastics Treaty came out on March 2, 2022 and its first negotiations will be from November 28 to December 2 in Punta del Este, Uruguay, where measures covering the entire life cycle of plastic will be discussed.