World’s Top Polluters Revealed by Break Free from Plastic’s 2019 Brand Audit
Information on waste collected by more than 72,000 volunteers on World Cleanup Day 2019 pointed to the brands most responsible for generating plastic waste. This week, Break Free From Plastic (BFFP) released their second global brand audit, Branded Vol. II: Identifying the World’s Top Corporate Plastic Polluters.
On 2019’s World Clean Up Day held September 21, more than 72 thousand volunteers from 51 countries around the world collected 476,423 pieces of plastic from coastlines, riversides, and within their communities – 43% of which were marked with a clear consumer brand. In 2019, BFFP had over seven times as many volunteers contribute to this brand audit as it did in 2018, recording twice the amount of single-use plastic.
The World’s Top Corporate Plastic Polluters
The Top 3 Global Polluters are the same as those from 2018: Coca Cola, Nestlé, and Pepsico. The other seven companies the brand audit identified as top plastic polluters include: Mondelez International, Unilever, Mars, Procter & Gamble, Colgate-Palmolive, Philips Morris International, and Perfetti van Melle.
The following table summarizes the key results from the 2019 brand audit:
| Rank | Company Name |
|---|---|
| 1 | Coca Cola |
| 2 | Nestlé |
| 3 | Pepsico |
| 4 | Mondelez International |
| 5 | Unilever |
Such brand audits are a powerful tool for holding consumer goods companies accountable for their role in the global plastic waste problem, revealing just how widespread and damaging their throwaway plastic business model has become. “There is a great need to better understand the sources and priority products that contribute to plastic pollution closer to the source, so we can better intervene on solutions,” the BFFP report says.
Analysis of Key Global Brands
For the second year in a row, Coca Cola came is as the #1 global polluter. In just one day, an incredible 11,732 branded Coca Cola plastics were collected and recorded – more than the next three top global polluters combined. In the past, Coca Cola has attempted to address its role in the plastic pollution crisis by promoting plastic packaging using plastic collected from the ocean, or using plastic bottles made from plants, or bioplastics. But these “solutions” merely reinforce the myth that single-use plastic can be sustainable.
According to the report, the #2 polluter, Nestlé, has announced its commitment to making all of its packaging recyclable or reusable by 2025 – but with no clear plan for reducing the total amount of single-use plastics it produces. The company sells over a billion products a day in single-use plastic. In spite of these claims, on the shores of Lake Geneva, home to Nestlé’s global headquarters, Greenpeace Switzerland volunteers collected 1,124 plastic items in just two hours on World Cleanup Day.
Unilever, the #5 plastic polluter, has promised to reduce its role as a plastic polluter by using chemical recycling, according to BFFP’s report. This technology, however, is unproven, extremely energy intensive, and its adoption on a large scale is completely unfeasible.
Common Types of Plastic and Community Impact
Overall, the most common types of plastics collected throughout the audit included:
- PET plastics – clear or tinted plastic often used in drink bottles, cups, and pouches
- HDEP plastics – white or coloured plastic
- PVC plastics – hard or rubbery plastic used in building materials, toys, and shower curtains
The dedication of volunteers was vital to this research. The Trash Heroes of Indonesia were even awarded a silver medal in recognition of their 7,520 volunteers! The volunteers in Ambon, Indonesia were hit with a 6.5-magnitude earthquake and evacuated from their homes – and yet still retrieved their brand audits to submit their data to BFFP, a true, inspiring commitment to these heroes fighting to improve their communities and move toward a waste-free future.
Ultimately, these pivots and marketed alternatives made by global brands are ignoring the primary issue – we need to reduce our dependence on plastic altogether, and that starts at the source with these primary producers.
