With the new boreholes installed by Voltic, a subsidiary of Coca-Cola Beverages Africa, each community now has access to a regular supply of water.

“Water is a priority for Voltic because it is essential to life, our beverages and the communities we serve,” said Flora Jika, General Manager, Voltic.

“As part of the Coca-Cola system, our 2030 Water Security Strategy is focused on accelerating the actions needed to increase water security where we operate, source ingredients and touch people’s lives.

“We do that by contributing toward sustainable, clean water access that improves livelihoods and wellbeing,” said Jika.

“The 2030 Water Strategy is grounded in the fact that water is a shared resource. As such, our work is organised to address water security in our operations, our watersheds and our communities,” Jika said.

“Water is a priority for the Coca-Cola system because it is the first ingredient in all our beverages and is essential to the communities we serve.

“The Coca-Cola Company’s 2030 Water Security Strategy focuses on increasing water security. We work with partners to provide access to a steady supply of clean water for people and ecosystems in the areas where we operate and source ingredients,” Ramogase said.

“We do that by contributing toward sustainable, clean water access that improves livelihoods and wellbeing while protecting against water-related disasters.

“Inside our operations, we are committed to regenerative water use. This means using less water as well as re-using and treating wastewater.

“For example, in Kenya we opened a new wastewater treatment plant at our Equator Bottlers plant in Kisumu, which will promote more sustainable water use and help reduce the factory’s environmental impact. The new plant will enable us to treat and recycle wastewater generated from the production facility, which will be used for non-potable purposes such as irrigation and cleaning.

”Our subsidiary, Coca-Cola Beverages Botswana, signed an agreement last year with the Botswana University of Agriculture and Natural Resources to donate water from its newly installed water treatment plant for agricultural irrigation at the campus. The new state-of-the-art water treatment plant has made the company fully effluent compliant by ensuring that clean water is returned to the environment.

“For our packaging, we seek to drive a circular economy because this helps to reduce waste and carbon emissions. We’re working to use more recycled content in our packaging, to expand our use of refillable bottles, and to collect packaging for recycling through Coca-Cola’s World Without Waste initiative. We also partner to design new solutions for packaging.

“As an example, Coca-Cola and other like-minded industries came together in 2004 to set up the PET Recycling Company (PETCO) in South Africa to promote and regulate the recycling of PET plastic, taking responsibility for recovering and recycling beverage PET plastic bottles.

“The PETCO model has proven so effective it has been extended to three other markets, Kenya, Tanzania and Ethiopia, with plans to include additional countries like Namibia.

“While we strive to make progress on our own, we are committed to fostering partnerships that drive collective impact in areas including water stewardship, packaging circularity, climate action and many more.

“We engage with stakeholders, including governments, NGOs, communities, suppliers, business partners, customers and consumers in all the markets where we operate, in many forums and formats. Feedback from our stakeholders allows us to learn and improve, and informs our business and sustainability strategy,” Ramogase said.

ENDS

Under the theme “Inspiring Excellence in Ghana’s Beverage Industry”, the event celebrated the beverage industry and its stakeholders for contributing significantly to the Ghanaian economy.

The award recognizes excellence in Ghana’s beverage industry while providing an avenue for stakeholders and key players in the industry to network and deliberate on issues relating to its advancement.

In another endorsement of the company’s industry leadership in Ghana, Voltic (GH) Limited’s Public Affairs, Communications and Sustainability Manager, Worlasi Seddoh Bedu-Mensah, has been invited to serve as a Subject Matter Expert in Sustainability by the country’s Chartered Institute of Supply Chain Management.

Voltic Natural Mineral Water is sourced from a natural aquifer over 60 meters underground, which contains essential natural minerals such as Calcium, Magnesium, Bicarbonate, Nitrate, Sulphate, Potassium and Iron.

Last year Voltic (GH) Limited launched its Voltic Premium Brand, with a 750ml premium bottle in a new sleek design featuring a distinct royal blue label and the new golden Voltic logo boldly embossed on it.

A product of Voltic (GH) Limited, a subsidiary of Coca-Cola Beverages Africa, the new premium water comes in a range of sizes including 500ml, 750ml, 1.5L and 19.5L.

The water is bottled at the source at water processing plants located in Medie and Akwadum in the Greater Accra and Eastern regions.

“As a subsidiary of Coca-Cola Beverages Africa, we are leading the industry in making our value chain increasingly sustainable in the way that we manufacture our products, how we distribute them and how we sell them,” said Public Affairs, Communication and Sustainability Director, Worlasi Mensah.

“We have the scale and reach to make a real difference, and we’re using our leadership position to drive change and help put our planet on a more sustainable path.

“Our goal is to collect and recycle the equivalent of 100% of the packaging we sell, working in partnership with The Coca-Cola Company which launched a sustainable packaging strategy in 2018 called World Without Waste.

“We can’t do it alone. We work with stakeholders, nonprofits, communities, governments and our industry toward a clean environment,” said Mensah.

“Tackling the global plastic waste crisis requires cross-sector collaboration and alignment on common principles and targets. We work with a range of stakeholders at a regional and local level.

“This includes partnering with governments and community organisations to strengthen recycling infrastructure and boost collection rates, collaborating with customers, peers and industry associations to shape public policy that supports a circular economy; and teaming up with suppliers, startups and R&D partners to fuel sustainable packaging innovation.

“We’re working toward these solutions to create a circular economy that benefits society and works for our business. We’ve set ambitious goals for our business, to take responsibility for our packaging across its lifecycle and reduce ocean pollution,” said Mensah.

ENDS