But it’s not enough to reduce, recycle, and replenish, says Manley. Each year, an estimated three to five billion episodes of diarrheal diseases in Third World countries kill more than two million people—more than 90 percent of them are children. According to the World Health Organization, some 88 percent of the sickness is due to bad water, sanitation, and hygiene. “Water challenges have become more complex,” Manley explains. “There’s a need for all of us in business and government to think seriously how we can continue to be responsible users of what is, in some ways, an unlimited resource, but, from a freshwater perspective, a resource highly under stress.”
In 2005, Coca-Cola—along with other corporations, non-profits, and NGOs—formed the Global Water Challenge to “deliver clean water and sanitation and hygiene education projects … share best practices and raise global visibility and support” for the issue, according to its website. Through GWC, Coca-Cola funds and supports more than seventy clean water projects in forty countries.
Packaging.
Within Coca-Cola’s Environment and Water Resources Division, a team of researchers uses a computer model to examine how to use less packaging in Coke products. “They shave away tiny corners or reconstitute a cap on a bottle or a lid on a can,” says Manley. “Those kinds of little things may save a tiny fraction of material, but if you’re producing 1.4 billion beverages a day, every bit can make a pretty significant difference.”
With all those containers, Coca-Cola also focuses on recycling, both within the company and through funding outside programs, says Manley. Coca-Cola has invested in bottle-to-bottle recycling facilities in Mexico, Austria, and the Philippines and plans to build more, she adds. The company also invests in programs such as the Recycle Bank in the Northeast, which offers consumers incentives to recycle.
Consumers at the New World of Coke Museum in Atlanta can benefit from Coca-Cola’s recycling efforts; the museum features a new line of merchandise made of recycled material including T-shirts, bags, and notebooks made of recycled bottles. Manley says the company expects to grow the line and eventually sell at other retailers.
