Key Takeaways:
- PepsiCo Europe and Yara have entered a long-term partnership to help decarbonize the food value chain.
- Yara will provide up to 165,000 tons of low-carbon and premium fertilizers annually to PepsiCo Europe.
- The partnership aims to increase nutrient use efficiency, boost yields, and reduce the carbon footprint of crops.
- The collaboration supports the European Union’s climate targets and aligns with PepsiCo’s and Yara’s sustainability goals.
- Approximately 1,000 farms across Europe will benefit from advanced crop nutrition programs and precision farming tools.
PepsiCo Europe and Yara, a prominent crop nutrition company, have announced a strategic long-term partnership to decarbonize the food value chain across Europe. This collaboration aims to provide farmers with advanced crop nutrition programs, precision farming tools, and support for transitioning to more sustainable practices. The initiative aligns with both companies’ commitments to creating a sustainable food system in accordance with the European Union’s climate targets.
Advanced Crop Nutrition and Precision Farming Tools
The partnership involves Yara supplying up to 165,000 tons of fertilizers per year to PepsiCo Europe by 2030. These fertilizers will primarily include Yara Climate Choice products, featuring low-carbon footprint fertilizers produced from renewable ammonia and low-carbon ammonia via carbon capture and storage (CCS). Additionally, Yara will provide its standard premium nitrate-based mineral fertilizers, which have a significantly lower carbon footprint than most non-EU fertilizers due to catalyst technology.
Participating farmers will benefit from advanced crop nutrition products and precision farming digital tools designed to increase nutrient use efficiency (NUE), boost yields, and reduce the carbon footprint of their crops. These tools will include full-season crop and soil data capture and monitoring using PepsiCo’s CropTrak and ML Analytics tool, complemented by Yara’s digital solutions such as satellite imagery via the AtFarm platform and the MegaLab soil analysis.
Commitment to Sustainability and Net-Zero Goals
Archana Jagannathan, Chief Sustainability Officer at PepsiCo Europe, stated, “This partnership with Yara aligns with our end-to-end transformation known as PepsiCo Positive (pep+) and will be critical as we transition towards the net-zero food system of the future. Providing our farmers with fertilizers that have a lower carbon footprint and supporting them to improve crop nutrition end-to-end will allow us to make a significant step towards our target of achieving net zero by 2040.”
Similarly, Mónica Andrés Enríquez, Executive Vice President for Europe at Yara, commented, “To grow a nature-positive food future and transform our food system, we need to collaborate across the food value chain. We’re excited to work with first movers like PepsiCo to help make this a reality. Decarbonizing food production will be critical to delivering on the Paris Agreement – and farmers will play a key role in helping us get there.”
Supporting Farmers and Scaling Regenerative Practices
The partnership will initially focus on potatoes, a key crop for PepsiCo, and expand to other crops such as oats and corn. Approximately 1,000 farms, covering around 128,000 hectares across the European Union and the UK, will be included in this initiative. The collaboration aims to drive the adoption of regenerative agricultural practices, ensuring that farmers are supported through transition costs and their livelihoods are not adversely impacted.
Fertilizers represent a significant opportunity to reduce emissions, as fertilizer production and in-field emissions account for half of PepsiCo’s average potato carbon footprint in Europe. This partnership aims to support a 24 percentage point reduction target in production emissions and a 5 percentage point reduction target for in-field emissions while maintaining crop quality and yields.
