Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Food & Drink

Nestlé’s environment-friendly initiatives will make you feel good about your daily cup of coffee

Nestle is making some groundbreaking changes, and we are here for it

Lindsay Parrill
By
a close up of tons of coffee beans
Igor Haritanovich/Pexels / Igor Haritanovich/Pexels

Most of us begin our day with a rich and steamy, piping-hot cup of coffee, without giving much thought to the beans’ journey from the farm into our favorite mug. Sure, we can do our best to shop wisely, and frequent smaller, local, more environmentally friendly purveyors, but it’s hard to do all the time. We can do our best, but at the end of the day, being earth-conscious of every single thing we put in our grocery carts can get pricey and, frankly, inconvenient. That’s why we love it when the big dogs of the grocery world do something right when it comes to the planet. And Nestle’s plan is one we can all get on board with.

Nestle, the world’s largest packaged food company, and owner of the tremendously popular Nestle coffee brand Nespresso, is switching things up when it comes to practices that will help not only their business, but our planet, and the farmers who work tirelessly for those delicious Nescafé coffee beans.

Cup of coffee with beans on table
Mike Kenneally/Unsplash / Mike Kenneally/Unsplash

Last year, the coffee giant announced its Nescafé Plan 2030, which included plans to not only increase farmers’ income, but create better social conditions as well. Nestlé revealed its plan to invest over one billion Swiss francs in the next seven years in an effort to focus on creating more sustainable coffee, emphasizing more environmentally friendly farming practices and incentives for farmers. Working together, Nescafé and coffee farmers in Brazil, Vietnam, Mexico, Colombia, Côte d’Ivoire, Indonesia, and Honduras are testing multiple regenerative agriculture practices and their effectiveness on things like reducing greenhouse gas emissions in each individual country.

Recommended Videos

David Rennie, Head of Nestlé Coffee Brands, said at the time, “Climate change is putting coffee-growing areas under pressure. Building on 10 years’ experience of the Nescafé Plan, we’re accelerating our work to help tackle climate change and address social and economic challenges in the Nescafé value chains.”

Related

Of course, announcing a plan like that is one thing. Whether or not it works is a whole other story. The company recently published the  Nescafé Plan 2030 Progress Report, so you can see exactly how well they’re doing.

  • Last year, trainings on regenerative agricultural practices reached more than 100’000 farmers in 14 countries.
  • 1.4 million trees were planted in and around coffee farms that supply coffee to the company, designers to prevent coffee’s over-exposure to the sun (in addition to creating an additional revenue stream for farmers).
  • Nescafé distributed 23 million disease and drought-resistant, high-yield coffee plantlets in an effort to rejuvenate coffee plots, increase productivity, and reduce the use of agrochemicals.

The company is also piloting financial support schemes designed to help farmers transition to sustainable practices. This includes both conditional cash incentives to encourage and reward regenerative agriculture, as well as weather insurance schemes designed to combat the effect of climate change on farmers. Some 3,000 coffee farmers in Côte d’Ivoire, Indonesia and Mexico, are part of this program. (Coffee farmers in these countries typically don’t earn enough for a living income.) The pilots are ongoing, but the company says it’s “seeing encouraging results and strong farmer engagement.”

Yustika Muharastri, monitoring and evaluation manager from the Rainforest Alliance, said, “The Rainforest Alliance works with the Nescafé team to monitor and assess their efforts through the Nescafé Plan. We have observed encouraging trends, including improved incomes in some countries, and increased adoption of important regenerative practices, such as integrated weed and pest management.”

Editors' Recommendations

Lindsay Parrill
Lindsay Parrill
Contributor
Lindsay is a graduate of California Culinary Academy, Le Cordon Bleu, San Francisco, from where she holds a degree in…
Make the most of your leftovers: How to reheat crab legs so they’re just as good the next day
How to make this tasty crustacean taste good the second time around
Close-up of crab legs

Within the vast ocean of seafood, crab holds a special pace. The crustaceans are other-worldly; the meat is rich and delicious, and the act of eating it is all kinds of fun. So much fun, in fact, you're likely to order too much and have some leftovers to work with.

Now, it hasn't been easy for our seafaring and pinching friends lately (especially snow crabs). Climate change has altered water temperatures and made the environment for any number of species of crabs more challenging (meanwhile, green crabs are invasive in many areas, and some companies are getting pretty creative about eradicating them). That said, do your homework before buying or ordering, and make sure you're doing things sustainably.

Read more
Why does coffee make you poop? Science explains
Before pouring that next cup, coffee drinkers everywhere should really know why it affects them the way it does
Pouring a cup of coffee.

One of the most common morning rituals of people around the globe is the habitual consumption of coffee. For some, it’s an actual process, preferring to make their own perfect cup of pour-over or fresh French press brew, while others prefer to wait in line at their local cafe and have someone else make it for them. Whatever your route may be, coffee is consumed by millions on a daily basis. But once that first sip (or cup) hits, we start to feel the effects in more areas than one. Why does coffee make you poop and is it anything coffee lovers should be concerned about?

For most, is the elixir of the Gods, helping them to fully become alert and awake, allowing their brains to function at full capacity. It's an instant jolt of alertness and focus. For some, however, it jolts another phenomenon as well. According to research, about 3 out of 10 people experience the unusual side effect coffee has on the digestive system. For those people, it makes them have to use the bathroom. While there is evidence as to why this phenomenon exists, the science behind it is still not exact. Let's see why coffee does make you run to the bathroom and if you need to skip your morning cup.

Read more
Should you drink coffee while intermittent fasting? We have the answers
What is and isn't acceptable while intermittent fasting?
A cup of coffee photographed from above.

There's always a new fad or trend when it comes to health and nutrition, all with the promise of helping an individual get to their goals that much faster or more efficiently. In recent years, intermittent fasting has become that trend and is increasingly becoming a more popular dietary approach. Whether you’re trying to lose weight, improve your insulin sensitivity, boost your cognitive performance, or balance your hormonal profile, there are many reasons why people try intermittent fasting.
One of the most common questions among people interested in intermittent fasting or new to the dietary approach is, "Can you drink coffee while intermittent fasting?" Many people rely on their morning coffee to jump-start their day, so not being able to drink coffee while intermittent fasting can potentially be a deal breaker in terms of adopting the diet for coffee lovers.

What is intermittent fasting?
Rather than many fad diets that are defined or confined by what you can and can’t eat, intermittent fasting is an eating pattern that is characterized by when you can or can’t eat. Essentially, intermittent fasting is a dietary approach that involves restricting the time period in which you eat during the day and deliberately extending the period of fasting.

Read more