Keurig Dr Pepper

No leading practices were identified for the company in the governance and strategy measurement area.

Plastic use and packaging waste
The company has set diverse targets, including converting to 100% recyclable or compostable packaging by 2025 as well as to use 30% post-consumer recycled content across its packaging portfolio by 2025. The company has other brand-exclusive targets. In addition, Keurig Dr Pepper states that, at the end of 2020, it had achieved 90% recyclable or compostable packaging. For the company to lead the way in its segment in this area, it should continue to work towards achieving 100% of its targets.

Food safety
The company discloses that it has a food and safety and quality management system, which is the cornerstone of its food safety practices. Furthermore, it discloses that 100% of its own manufacturing sites, along with co-manufacturers, are certified to a scheme recognised by the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFS). The company also reports having 92% and 70% of its ingredient and packaging suppliers, respectively, GFSI-certified. The company has an opportunity to improve by achieving 100% coverage of suppliers via a GFSI-certified scheme.

Farmer and fisher productivity and resilience
The company has met its goal of engaging one million people in its supply chain to significantly improve their lives, and it has a longstanding practice of investing in social impact projects. Keurig Dr Pepper also has a monitoring and evaluation guide for these projects, highlighting focus areas for improving farmer livelihoods and climate resilience. The company discloses several outcome indicators, such as number of coffee producers receiving training, average yield and improvement per farmer.

Sustainable development strategy
KDP has disclosed 4 pillars around which it has organised its sustainable development strategy and it covers elements across the benchmark’s dimensions of environment nutrition and social inclusion. Following the recent merger of the company, it is still in the process of restructuring its strategy and it’s bound to provide its identified and prioritised topics, and an overall more complete sustainable strategy during 2021.

Governance and accountability for sustainability
Keurig Dr Pepper discloses that its sustainable development strategy oversight and responsibility lie with the board of directors, which updates and approves long-term sustainability goals. The company also has a chief sustainability officer, who leads the strategic development along with other members of the organisation. While some elements of the company’s remuneration policy are publicly available, no information was found on how the company links sustainable development performance and remuneration.

Stakeholder engagement
Regarding its engagement with stakeholders, the company discloses an ongoing dialogue, which helps inform its sustainable development strategy. In its sustainability report, the company discloses a list of its stakeholders, along with an overview of the issues discussed and means of engagement. The stakeholders engaged cover the entire value chain, and the issues raised are relevant to the benchmark’s measurement areas. However, the company could enhance its transparency by disclosing how its relevant stakeholders were identified.

Scope 1, 2 and 3 greenhouse gas emissions
The company has committed to reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and has set a target to reduce absolute scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions by 30% by 2030, following a well-below 2-degree trajectory, and a 15% reduction in select categories of its scope 3 emissions by 2030. Its target for scope 1 and 2 emissions has been approved by the Science Based Targets initiative. The company reports progress for some locations via its CDP Climate Change survey, but it has yet to disclose more comprehensive data. The company could improve its performance by expanding its scope 3 target to all categories, increasing its reporting on its progress against both its targets and by aligning with a 1.5-degree trajectory.

Soil health and agrobiodiversity
The company is committed to soil health and agrobiodiversity via its sourcing policies, through which it pledges to source 100% of its high-risk commodities responsibly. It has already achieved this for coffee and expects to do the same for cocoa by the end of 2021. It also commits to supporting regenerative agriculture and conservation on 250,000 acres of land by 2030, representing 50% of the land used. The company is part of multiple sustainability initiatives, like SAI Platform and Blue Harvest. It can improve in this area by reporting progress against is targets, which is expected in the next reporting cycle.

Water use
The company discloses targets and progress against them via the CDP Water survey and its sustainability report. As part of its initiatives around water, the company has conducted a risk mapping of water-stressed areas using the Water Resources Institute’s Aqueduct tool. While it has engaged with its suppliers on topics around water use, the company has not disclosed specific engagement with suppliers in the context of water-stressed areas, which is keeping the company from earning a top score.

Availability of healthy foods
The company discloses that it introduces reformulated products via its positive hydration framework, which includes providing a serving of fruits or vegetables, or being below 40 calories per serving with a functional attribute and has set a target to reach 54% of its portfolio following this criterion. However, the company has not set a threshold regarding the level of sugar contained in its beverages. It has an opportunity to improve by doing so or by adhering to a recognised nutrition profiling system.

Clear and transparent labelling
Keurig Dr Pepper discloses that it has rolled out back-of-pack labels by adding ingredient descriptions, calorie information and helpful comparisons to other offerings, while also disclosing this information via its website. The company also commits to voluntary front-of-pack labelling. However, it could improve readability by using an interpretive front-of-pack label. While the company discloses achieving 100% roll-out on labelling, it could improve its transparency by providing more relevant information regarding this in its reports.

Responsible marketing
While the company has a commitment to market its products responsibly, particularly to children, it has an opportunity to disclose evidence of activities promoting healthy beverages.

Child and forced labour
The company does not disclose a commitment to prohibit child labour and forced labour in its operations.

Living wage
The company does not disclose that it pays its workers a living wage or requires its suppliers to do the same. Neither has it set targets to do so in the future.

Health and safety of vulnerable groups
The company does not disclose that it specifically recognises the health and safety risks to vulnerable groups, such as migrant and temporary labourers, women and young farmers.

Land rights
The company has a sourcing policy for most of its high-risk commodities, which covers fair treatment of suppliers, and it adheres to recognised initiatives around responsible sourcing, such as Fairtrade International, Fair-Trade USA, Rainforest Alliance and UTZ. Furthermore, the company has established in its supplier code of conduct that suppliers shall respect the rights and titles to property and land of individuals, indigenous peoples and local communities, and in negotiations regarding property, shall adhere to principles of free, prior and informed consent. While Keurig Dr Pepper has set up a grievance mechanism, it still has an opportunity to disclose on its prompt and adequate remediation mechanism.

Keurig Dr Pepper commits to respecting human rights along its value chain and requires its supply chain partners to respect the human rights of workers. Furthermore, the company discloses how it acts on human rights risks and has a grievance mechanism in place that is accessible for both internal and external individuals to raise complaints and concerns. However, its lacks commitments to international human rights frameworks, for example specific ILO conventions, and lack an identification process as part of its due diligence process for human rights issues.

The company commits to respecting the health and safety of its workers and those in its supply chain and to decent working hours for workers in its supply chain. Furthermore, it discloses information around the implementation and monitoring of its commitments regarding health and safety, collective bargaining and gender equality. However, no commitments were found regarding paying a living wage, collective bargaining, workforce diversity or gender equality and women’s empowerment.

Keurig Dr Pepper commits to conducting its business with respect for anti-bribery and anti-corruption practices. However, it does not define a process for identifying its risks in this regard. No relevant information was found regarding other key ethical business topics, including a global tax approach, lobbying and political engagement, and data protection.