Water
Our products depend on water throughout their life cycle, from the production and processing of raw materials to their use by our consumers.
Water sustainability
As a manufacturer of food, home and personal care products, our use of water resources is both direct and indirect. Water is used by our suppliers of agricultural raw materials for the growing of crops, in our factories as part of the manufacturing process and finally by our consumers when they use and dispose of our products through activities such as washing, laundry and cooking.
Understanding these impacts is central to our approach. Although we recognise action and behaviour change at a consumer and governmental level are crucial, where we can make the most impact is through the design and innovation of products which need less water to use.
Our approach
There are four elements to our approach to water sustainability:
reducing water use in our manufacturing operations;
working with agricultural suppliers to reduce their usage;
designing products that require less water during consumer use; and
participating in initiatives that aim to address these challenges through partnerships
Water use in manufacturing (globally)
Our manufacturing operations account for less than 5% of our total water imprint. We started systematically measuring water consumption in manufacturing in 1995. Since then, we have reduced overall water consumption per tonne of production in manufacturing by 61.7%.
We measure water consumption in all our factories. The data represent all water consumed and include water used as an ingredient in products as well as uncontaminated non-contact cooling water and wastewater.
