PepsiCo to introduce bottles made from recycled plastic in Africa, Middle East & South Asia

PepsiCo is introducing bottles made from recycled plastic in several of the region’s markets across beverage brands like Aquafina and Pepsi.

With only one country in the region allowing the use of recycled plastic in food and beverage packaging in 2020, PepsiCo continues its journey of policy unlocks aiming to introduce recycled bottles across 10 AMESA countries by 2023.

PepsiCo aims to continue its progress towards expanding plastic collection programs to 14 AMESA markets by developing recycling infrastructure through advocacy and partnerships by 2023.

The reiterated sustainability commitment comes as PepsiCo marks one year of its strategic, end-to-end transformation, called pep+, which puts sustainability and human capital at the center of how the company will create growth and value. From sourcing ingredients to making and selling its products more sustainably, pep+ connects the future of its business with the future of the planet.

Envisioning a world where packaging never becomes waste, PepsiCo’s pep+ ambition aims to design 100% of its packaging to be recyclable, compostable, biodegradable or reusable by 2025 and to cut virgin plastic from non-renewable sources per serving across its global beverages and convenient foods portfolio by 50% by 2030. PepsiCo already introduced recycled plastic in some beverage brands in South Africa and Bangladesh in 2022 and is gearing to bring in recycled plastic bottles across Egypt, Qatar, Kuwait, Pakistan, and other AMESA countries by 2023.

PepsiCo is also the first food and beverage company to locally introduce 100% rPET in Qatar and Kuwait in 2022, followed by other GCC countries by 2023. In Egypt, as policymakers lay out an ambitious COP27 roadmap, PepsiCo launched the biggest PET collection program in Egypt ‘Recycle for Tomorrow’ in 2021 and is now introducing locally manufactured recycled plastic bottles as part of its efforts to build a circular economy by 2030. PepsiCo wants to work with bottlers and partners in each country to help build a circular and inclusive value chain in line with its global pep+ goals.

Eugene Willemsen, CEO, PepsiCo AMESA said, “Packaging circularity has been a key priority of PepsiCo’s pep+ sustainability goals. Our partnership with region-wide governments and industry coalitions has helped successfully unlock use of rPET across 13 AMESA countries by 2022. Recognizing one-year of pep+, we continue our journey towards circularity with a renewed vigor of expanding recycled plastic into 10 AMESA countries by 2023 in PepsiCo brands through consumer education. Our commitment to multi-stakeholder collaboration and accelerated investment in recycling infrastructure will advance our efforts in waste management and packaging circularity.”

PepsiCo in AMESA has supported 107,000 tonnes of plastic bottles and 19,000 tonnes of Multi Layered Plastic (MLP) films to be collected and recycled across seven countries as per 2021 estimates. This was delivered through mass collection partnerships, deploying reverse vending machines, launching incentive programs, and partnering with recyclers for ensuring the beneficial use of collected plastics. Earlier this year, in the capacity of Expo 2020 Dubai’s Official Beverage and Snack Partner, PepsiCo helped to reduce the use of single-use plastic, diverted at least 85% of on-site waste and avoided more than 500,000 plastic bottles through Aquafina water stations as well as by replacing plastic bottles with Aquafina aluminum cans and glass bottles.

In partnership with government ministries across AMESA countries, there are plans to boost accelerator programs and hackathons like the MENA edition of the Greenhouse Accelerator Program and The Egypt 2030 Hackathon that promote circularity solutions in line with PepsiCo’s vision for a more sustainable food system. PepsiCo AMESA is committed to working with multiple stakeholders to take collective action that will accelerate progress towards a circular economy.