Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Nestlnamed top plastic polluters in global audit of plastic waste

Coca-Cola Company, PepsiCo and Nestlcontinue to be the world's biggest plastic polluters, according to data compiled by theglobal environmental organizationBreak Free From Plastic.

The group had more than 14,000 volunteersin 55 countries in Asia, Europe and North America collect nearly 350,000 pieces of tossed plastic to trace the source of the waste andpublished itsresultsMonday as part of apush to reducesingle-use plastics.

The auditfound that 63 per centof the plastics examinedwere clearly marked with a consumer brand name.

Volunteers collected plastic fromcity streets, parks, forests, beaches, coastal areasand other siteswhere plastic waste accumulates. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, about 13 per centof the itemsexamined came from audits ofwaste discarded indoors in homes, offices, schools and elsewhere.

The group also relied on data collected by more than 300 so-called waste pickers. These are people who make a living by salvagingreusable or recyclable materials from landfill or other waste disposal sites.

The brand audits were conducted between Aug.1 and Sept.30. Volunteers identified 44 different retail brands in Canada and found the highest number of plastic items they collected came from Costco, followed by PepsiCo, SCJohnson and Walmart.

Break Free From Plastic saidthe top three companieson thelist, well known for the plastic bottles used to package their product, have made the list every year since the group's first brand auditfor plastic polluters was conducted in 2018.

The Coca-Cola label was discovered inmore countries than the twoplastic-polluting firms that were next on the list. All three companies have said they are working to address wasteful packaging but at least one environmentalist alleges they are insteadramping up their use of plastic.

The group acknowledged the limitations of relying on self-reported data submitted by participants from around the world.

"The data submitted is a sample of global plastic waste and cannot claim to be fully representative of all plastic pollution," the report said. "It is possible that some brands not captured in this report may produce even more plastic pollution than those listed in this report."

It also said that while it tried tomatch brands with their parent companies, it's possible that somebrand-parent company correlations were missed becausethe data included "thousands of brands and parent companies from many countries in different languages."

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Same big brands make the list

"It's not surprising to see the same big brands on the podium as the world's top plastic polluters for three years in a row," Abigail Aguilar, plastics campaign regional co-ordinator of Greenpeace Southeast Asia, said in a statement.

"These companies claim to be addressing the plastic crisis, yet they continue to invest in false solutions while teaming up with oil companies to produce even more plastic.

"To stop this mess and combat climate change, multinationals like Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and Nestlmust end their addiction to single-use plastic packaging and move away from fossil fuels."

Rounding out the top 10 brands for plastic pollutionin the report are:

• Unilever
• Mondelez International
• Mars, Inc.
• Procter & Gamble
• Philip Morris International
• Colgate-Palmolive
• Perfetti Van Melle

The most common items collected were plastic bags, followed by cigarette butts and plastic bottles.

"Only nineper cent of all the plastic ever made has been recycled, yet ... [producers] continue to hail recycling as the ultimate solution to combating the plastic pollution crisis," Break Free From Plastic said in its report.

"However, most single-use plasticsimply can't be recycled or it's just not economical to do so, especially when the cost of virgin plastic is very low."

Coke promises 50% recycled material by 2030

According to a report by the Changing Markets Foundation released in September, the Coca-Cola Company produces 2.9 million tonnes of plastic packaginga year, the largest volume of any company.

Coca-Colahas promised to make its products with 50 per cent of recycled material by 2030. PepsiCo has saidit will aim to reduce by 35 per cent its use of virgin (unrecycled) plastic content by 2025.Nestl has saidit's moving toward agoal of having all reusable or recyclable packaging in the next five years.

The companies named as the seven top polluters of plastic have joinedThe New Plastics Economy Global Commitment, an initiative to change the plastic system with the end goal of having all plastic packaging reusable, recyclable or compostable by 2025.

However, according to a report released last month by the Ellen MacArthurFoundation, which is working on the initiative along with the UN Environment Program, the signatories havereduced their use of virgin plastic by only 0.1 per centfrom 2018 to 2019.