Our Commitments

Our Commitments

About our commitments

As a company we are continuously evolving our portfolio to help create a healthier food environment.

We are reducing sugar in many of our drinks to help people meet the World Health Organization daily added sugar recommendations, providing clear and easy to understand nutritional information, offering smaller serving sizes and maintaining our longstanding commitment to responsible marketing.

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1. Offer low or no-calorie drink options in every market

To give greater choice, we’re providing more diet, light and zero-calorie drinks in our portfolio. We’ve already reformulated many of our drinks to contain less sugar and fewer calories – for example, Sprite and Nestea with Stevia (a herbal sweetener) now contain up to 30 percent fewer calories. We have committed to reduce added sugar per 100 ml of sparkling beverage in EU and Switzerland by 10% by vs. 2015. In addition, we plan to reduce by 25% the calorie content per 100ml of sparkling soft drinks across all our markets, by 2025.

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2. Provide transparent nutritional information, featuring calorie information on the front of all our packages

We make key nutritional information visible on front-of-pack labels on our bottles and cans. Guideline Daily Amount (GDA) labels provide at-a-glance information on calories, as well as on sugar, fat, saturated fat and salt content. At the end of 2018, we introduced, on a trial basis to several of our markets, new front-of-pack labelling, building on the current European-wide Reference Intake (R.I.) monochrome model, which reflects the nutrient content per 100ml of our drinks for sugars, salt, fat and saturated fat through a simple ‘traffic-light’ colour scheme of red, amber, green.

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3. Market responsibly, including no advertising to children under 12 anywhere in the world 

We are committed to marketing responsibly wherever we operate, across all advertising media and for all our products, especially when it comes to marketing to children.

To help us achieve this, we comply with The Coca‑Cola Company’s Global Responsible Marketing Policy and are signatories to the Union of European Soft Drinks Associations (UNESDA) responsible marketing and school sales commitments.

Health

We promote health and wellness as we believe this is an important issue – both for our business and for the communities we are part of.

We believe that delivering healthy and safe products is essential for our business’s economic, environmental and social impacts, helping to support community trust, customer satisfaction and choice.

To meet evolving consumer needs and preferences, we are focusing on offering consumers more of the products they want, including low- and no-sugar options, across categories and in more packages. Providing clear and transparent information also helps consumers make informed choices.

We support the current recommendation by several leading health authorities, including the World Health Organization, that people should limit their intake of added sugar to no more than 10% of their total energy/calorie consumption.

To address this issue, we have committed, in partnership with UNESDA, to reduce added sugar in our sparkling soft drinks by 10% between 2015 and 2020 across the EU and Switzerland. The reduction achieved in 2018 was 3% per 100ml. Moreover, during 2018 we set a new, broader commitment: to reduce the calories per 100ml of sparkling soft drinks by 25% by 2025 vs. 2015, across all of our countries.

Products and ingredients

We focus on being innovative around the products we offer, including expanding our range of zero-calorie drinks and reducing the calorie content of many of the products in our portfolio. We also promote active lifestyles and clearer labelling on packaging; this is supported by broader community engagement programmes focused on health and wellness.

By educating our consumers we empower them to make informed choices around which foods and drinks are most appropriate to meet their individual needs.

In 2018, we rolled out our new recipe for the core Fanta Orange variant with 30% less sugar in several markets, including Hungary, Greece, Cyprus and Ireland, and have made preparations for roll-out in other markets.

Moreover, we broke new ground with AdeZ, our first plant-based beverage blending seeds and fruits. We introduced AdeZ in May 2018, with flavours and packs appropriate for at-home consumption during breakfast, as well as unique offers for on-the-go or at-work snacking.

In a year packed with new product launches, the introduction of FUZETEA was our biggest system-wide effort. FUZETEA offers consumers a fresh, innovative, ready-todrink tea with a fusion of sustainably sourced tea extract, fruit juice and herbs. Blending these ingredients creates a multi-layered, contemporary tea taste, and a premium alternative within the category.

You can read more about our ingredients and approach to health and wellbeing in the links below.

Hydration

Drinking appropriate quantities of liquids is essential for our physical and mental well-being.

Water makes up, on average, between 60 and 65 percent of our total body weight. Even without taking any exercise, our body loses between 2 and 3 litres of liquid a day. If it isn’t replaced, we can get dehydrated, which may lead to headaches, tiredness, low attention levels and reduced degrees of physical performance.

As hydration is becoming a complex category ranging from basic thirst quenching to indulgent refreshment with flavoured waters, we have developed our product portfolio to meet the full spectrum of hydration needs. We entered the premium water segment in 2018 with GLACÉAU smartwater, which is processed to replicate nature’s water cycle, with the right amount of mineral salts to create a clean and crisp taste. Its sleek, modern and iconic design reflects the quality inside the bottle.

The hydration category accounts for more than half of non-alcoholic ready-to-drink volume, and almost 30% of retail value. According to industry estimates, it will also comprise the biggest incremental growth in our sector through 2025, contributing 45% of the incremental volume and 20% of the incremental value.

Studies show that the greater diversity in the drinks people consume, the more liquids they are likely to drink in total. This, in turn, contributes to keeping them optimally hydrated.

Related links and downloads

The Coca‑Cola Company: 2020 sustainable commitments

Promoting healthier diets through an evolved colour-coded nutritional labelling scheme

Press release: Coca‑Cola announces global commitments to help fight obesity

Coca‑Cola: our commitment to transparency - our actions and way forward

Coca‑Cola product facts website

What is in Coca‑Cola? A briefing on our ingredients (PDF, 260kb)

The Beverage Institute for Health and Wellness

European Hydration Institute

Nutritional labelling

As a System, we have long believed in the importance of providing people with clear, simple and meaningful front-of-pack information that can help support healthier and more informed food choices.

At the end of 2018, we introduced a new front‑of‑pack labelling, on a trial basis, in several markets. This builds on the current Europe-wide Reference Intake (RI) monochrome model with a system that reflects the nutrient content per 100ml of our drinks for sugars, salt, fat and saturated fat through a simple ‘traffic-light’ colour scheme of red, amber, green. It’s also identical to a scheme that is established throughout supermarket shelves in the UK and Ireland, and that we are proud to have voluntarily supported since 2014.

We’ve gained lots of positive experience in the UK and listened closely to the feedback from nutritionists, academics and consumer groups on this labelling scheme. After lots of discussions, we believe it’s important we now understand in real-life the difference that these labels can make to understanding, awareness and shopping behaviour.

We will be trialling them across a sample of our wide portfolio including our Coca‑Cola, Fanta and Sprite brands. We will publicly share our learnings as part of the EU-led process of assessing different labelling options for Europe.

Our work in colour-coded labelling began based on the finding from a 2017 OECD Obesity Update that "'traffic-light' systems have the potential to increase the number of people selecting a healthier option by about 18% and lead to a 4% decrease in calorie intake."  We continue to firmly believe that providing people with simple information that allows them to choose the right products for them can help support healthier diets, and we will publicly share the learnings we gain from our trials as we proceed.

Related links

Promoting healthier diets through an evolved colour-coded nutrition labelling scheme

Coca‑Cola product facts

Responsible marketing

The effective marketing of our brands is a core driver for our business, and we take steps to ensure that our marketing is not only effective but responsible and reasonable.

To help us achieve this, we comply with The Coca‑Cola Company’s Global Responsible Marketing Policy and are signatories to the Union of European Soft Drinks Associations (UNESDA) commitments.

When designing marketing communications, as a System, we do not appeal to children under the age of 12. Likewise, we do not place advertising in media where the audience consists of more than 35% children under the age of 12. This applies to all media, including television shows, print media, websites, social media, movies, SMS and email marketing, animation, third-party characters, games and contests, branded toys and merchandise, talent selection, point of sale, and merchandise items.

As part of the Coca‑Cola System, we support UNESDA’s commitment to not sell soft drinks in primary schools. We avoid engaging in any direct commercial activity in primary schools, except when requested by school authorities. As at the end of 2018, we offer no beverages sweetened with added sugars in secondary schools across the EU and Switzerland. We plan to gradually expand this approach to all of our markets over the coming years.

Related links

EU Pledge on advertising to children

UNESDA

UNESDA video: Behaving responsibly towards children

The Coca‑Cola Company: 2020 sustainability commitments