Environmental record

[edit]Water usage (India, U.S., U.K.)

PepsiCo’s usage of water was the subject of controversy in India in the early and mid 2000s in part because of the company’s alleged impact on water usage in a country where water shortages are a perennial issue. In this setting, PepsiCo was perceived by India-based environmental organizations as a company that diverted water to manufacture a discretionary product, making it a target for critics at the time.^[68]

As a result, in 2003 PepsiCo launched a country-wide program to achieve a “positive water balance” in India by 2009.^[69] In 2007, PepsiCo’s CEO Indra Nooyi made a trip to India to address water usage practices in the country, prompting prior critic Sunita Narain, director of the Centre for Science & Environment (CSE), to note that PepsiCo "seem(s) to be doing something serious about water now."^[68]According to the company’s 2009 corporate citizenship report,^[62] as well as media reports at the time,^[67] the company (in 2009) replenished nearly six billion liters of water within India, exceeding the aggregate water intake of approximately five billion liters by PepsiCo’s India manufacturing facilities.^[62]

Water usage concerns have arisen at times in other countries in which PepsiCo operates. In the U.S., water shortages in certain regions resulted in increased scrutiny on the company’s production facilities, which were cited in media reports as being among the largest water users in cities facing drought - such as Atlanta, Georgia.^[70][71] In response, the company formed partnerships with non-profit organizations such as the Earth Institute and Water.org, and in 2009 began cleaning new Gatorade bottles with purified air instead of rinsing with water, among other water conservation practices.^[72] In the United Kingdom, also in response to regional drought conditions, PepsiCo snacks brand Walkers' reduced water usage at its largest potato chip facility by 45 percent between the years 2001 and 2008. In doing so, the factory employed machinery which captured the water naturally contained in potatoes, and used that water to largely offset the need to bring in outside water to the factory.^[73][74]

As a result of water reduction practices and efficiency improvements, PepsiCo in 2009 saved more than 12 billion liters of water worldwide,^[75] compared to its 2006 water usage. Environmental advocacy organizations including the Natural Resources Defense Council and individual critics such as Rocky Anderson (mayor of Salt Lake City, Utah) voiced concerns in 2009, noting that the company could conserve additional water by refraining from the production of discretionary products such as Aquafina.^[76] The company maintained its positioning of bottled water as “healthy and convenient”, while also beginning to partially offset environmental impacts of such products through alternate means, including packaging weight reduction.^[76]

[edit]Pesticide regulation (India)

PepsiCo’s India operations were met with substantial resistance in 2003 and again in 2006, when an environmental organization in New Delhi made the claim that, based on its research, it believed that the levels of pesticides in PepsiCo (along with those from rival Coca-Cola Company), exceeded a set of proposed safety standards on soft drink ingredients that had been developed by the Bureau of Indian Standards.^[77] PepsiCo denied the allegations, and India's health ministry has also dismissed the allegations - both questioning the accuracy of the data compiled by the CSE, as it was tested by its own internal laboratories without being verified by outside peer review.^[78][79] The ensuing dispute prompted a short-lived ban on the sale of PepsiCo and Coca-Cola Company soft drinks within India's southwestern state of Kerala in 2006;^[80] however this ban was reversed by the Kerala High Court one month later.^[81]

In November, 2010, the Supreme Court of India invalidated a criminal complaint filed against PepsiCo India by the Kerala government, on the basis that the beverages did meet local standards at the time of the allegations. The court ruling stated that the “percentage of pesticides” found in the tested beverages was “within the tolerance limits subsequently prescribed in respect of such product,” since at the time of testing “there was no provision governing pesticide adulteration in cold drinks.”^[82][83] In 2010, PepsiCo was among the 12 multinational companies that displayed “the most impressive corporate social responsibility credentials in emerging markets”, as determined by the U.S. Department of State.^[84] PepsiCo's India unit received recognition on the basis of its water conservation and safety practices and corresponding results.^[85]

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