The Coca-Cola Company takes digital approach to Sustainability Reporting and releases first-ever GRI report

The Coca-Cola Company released its eighth systemwide Sustainability Report, titled Reasons to Believe. In the Company’s effort to increase transparency across its broad sustainability platform, this year’s Report was created using stakeholder feedback and, for the first time, follows the disclosure and reporting requirements of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) to achieve a self-declared grade level “B+.” With new digital tools available to more people, the report was also created in a unique format offering easier access from smart phones, tablets and other popular mobile devices. And, for the first time ever, its entire content is available exclusively online.

“Sustainability has been core to our business strategy for nearly 125 years,” said Chief Sustainability Officer Beatriz Perez. “After receiving feedback from a variety of stakeholders, we decided to make some significant changes to our sustainability reporting efforts. In addition to increasing transparency within the content, we have taken a digital approach to make the report more user-friendly and accessible on a variety of mobile devices. As we continue to strengthen our sustainability efforts, we also will innovate the means by which we share our progress.”

The Coca-Cola Company reported against the GRI’s key performance indicators in the areas of economic, environmental and social performance and self-declared a B grade against the new GRI G3.1 guidelines. This year’s report also received verification by a third party agency, indicating the agency’s approval of tracking systems, resulting in an overall B+ grade. The 2010/2011 Sustainability Report provides an in-depth review on the sustainability efforts of the Company and its nearly 300 bottling partners. The four main areas of focus include water stewardship, energy efficiency and climate protection, sustainable packaging and healthy communities. See the 2010/2011 Coca-Cola Company Sustainability Report at www.thecoca-colacompany.com/sustainabilityreport.

Performance highlights from the 2010/2011 Sustainability Report include:

Our PlantBottle™ technology, which allows us to replace 100 percent petroleum-based PET plastic with PET plastic that contains up to 30 percent material derived from plants, is becoming more widely used around the world. In 2010, we distributed 2.5 billion PlantBottle™ packages in 10 major markets, saving more than 60,000 barrels of oil and sequestering the equivalent of nearly 30,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide from our PET plastic bottles. By the end of 2011, PlantBottle™ packaging was available in 20 markets, and nearly 10 billion PlantBottle™ packages had been shipped.

In 2010, we improved our water use efficiency for the eighth consecutive year, reducing the average amount of water required to produce each beverage serving. As of the end of 2010, we had achieved 93 percent alignment, and by the end of 2011 we estimate 96 percent alignment with our stringent standards.

Also in 2010, our system increased production volume while reducing global carbon emissions by 2 percent, putting us a step closer to our goal of growing our business but not our carbon footprint. We also exceeded our goal of installing 150,000 hydrofluorocarbon (HFC)-free coolers in 2010, for a cumulative total of 277,000 such units by the end of that year. Additionally, we increased that total to 500,000 by the end of 2011.

We exceeded our goal to give back at least 1 percent of our operating income to communities worldwide through The Coca-Cola Company and The Coca-Cola Foundation in 2010 by giving $102 million.

We began to gain real traction with our new 5 BY 20 initiative to empower 5 million women entrepreneurs by 2020. Furthermore, we continued our commitment to promoting agricultural practices that are better for both farmers and the environment, through projects such as Haiti Hope and Project Nurture.

We continued working to make The Coca-Cola Company — and our entire system — a great place to work, starting with an unwavering commitment to workplace and human rights. We increased the number of women in system leadership roles, going from 23 percent in 2008 to just over 27 percent in 2010.

Since 2000, our average calories per serving decreased by 9 percent globally. We have more than 800 low- and no-calorie beverages–nearly 25 percent of our global portfolio. We committed to include calorie information on the front of nearly all our packages by the end of 2011 and have a physical activity program in 100 countries toward our goal to have one in every country in which we operate by 2015.