In its 2024 Report, Mondelēz reveals stalling progress in reducing its virgin rigid plastics in line with its targets for 2025, and a complete stagnation in designed-for-recycling packaging since 2022; yet it apparently draws nearer to its overall virgin plastic reduction goal.
Mondelēz’s three-part approach to sustainable packaging progress involves reducing and lightweighting its materials; designing its packaging for recyclability, phrasing out ‘problematic’ materials and implementing plastic recyclate; and supporting a transition into EPR schemes and other ‘effective’ policies by working with policymakers, investors, and other companies.
As of 2024, Mondelēz claims to have cut its overall plastic packaging footprint by approximately 4.6% compared to 2020 – progress it attributes to a ‘slowly increasing supply’ of new materials like recyclate for flexible film, as well as line trials conducted across various manufacturing sites.
By 2025, it held itself to a 5% reduction in virgin plastic overall, and specifically a 25% reduction in virgin rigid plastic, compared to 2020. So far, it has reportedly cut down on 4.6% of its virgin plastic in general – yet only 1.4% of the reduction is said to constitute rigid plastics.
Regarding this shortcoming, Mondelēz expresses concerns around sourcing new materials and overcoming the technical challenges required to ‘qualify and implement’ new packaging solutions.
“There are many challenges that may impede the advancement of a circular economy for packaging,” it states, “including a landscape of disconnected national and sub-national policies, the need to transform complex global supply chains, and the sourcing of high cost and limited availability materials.”
It describes an ongoing effort to understand and overcome the roadblocks it faces when sourcing rigid plastic materials sustainably, as well as a continual push to achieve ‘more sustainable sourcing’ for its flexible packaging.
It also aspired to design at least 98% of its packaging for recycling this year. At the end of 2024, the figure was recorded at 96% – the same percentage as 2023 and 2022.
Citing industry guidelines that encourage the replacement of ‘problematic’ materials like PVC and PVDC with recyclable alternatives, Mondelēz notes that 429,400 of the 875,800 metric tonnes of packaging it produced in 2024 was made of corrugated board. In total, that encompasses just over 49% of its packaging portfolio.
Paper was a close runner-up at 237,000 metric tonnes, which comes in at roughly 27%. Around 14% was attributed to flexible plastics at 124,500 metric tonnes, with rigid plastics closing the year on 53,400 metric tons – that translates to around 6% of the overall portfolio.
Where greenhouse gas emissions are concerned, the company only attributes 5% of its carbon footprint to its packaging – a figure that pales in comparison to the 70% contribution from raw materials for its products. By the end of 2024, it claimed to have cut down its greenhouse gas emissions by around 12% across its value chain compared to a 2018 base year.
Ongoing progress
Mondelēz reportedly engaged in various packaging redesigns last year. Its Southeast Asia Business Unit completely removed plastic trays from its Oreo, Chipsmore, Cosy, and other cookie product lines – a move thought to have eliminated around 150 metric tonnes of virgin plastic. This year, it plans to incorporate up to 50% recycled PET in its plastic cookie trays sold in North America.
Its chocolates have also undergone packaging redesigns. In 2024, the outer wrap for the Cadbury Fingers and Animals multipacks transitioned from plastic into paper, while its LU brand switched to paper packaging for its Véritable Petit Beurre, Petit Brun Extra, and LU Thé biscuit multipacks.
From 2025, the Mondelēz UK & Ireland Business Unit seeks to wrap approximately 300 million Cadbury bars in packaging that utilizes up to 80% ISCC+ mass balance certified recycled plastic; this is anticipated to cut down on virgin plastic consumption by around 600 metric tonnes every year.
Mondelēz emphasizes that R&D colleagues throughout its business can now access a digital EcoDesign tool to factor environmental impact into further innovations, reconfigurations, and transitions. The company also forefronts its use of Quantis’ eQoPack assessment tool when undertaking packaging designs with an environmental focus.
Last year, it claims to have leveraged its position as co-chair of the Consumer Goods Forum’s Plastic Waste Coalition of Action (PWCoA) Taskforce to push for common flexible paper packaging requirements and the inclusion of flexible plastic packaging in Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) principles. This position also led to its participation in founding the EPR Leadership Forum.
Similarly, as a founding member of the Circular Action Alliance, it highlights its collaboration with other companies to implement effective schemes throughout the United States, including the states of Oregon and Colorado. Mondelēz is also a member of the Ocean Plastics Leadership Network, through which it claims to pursue more sustainable production for chemically recycled flexible plastic.
Other efforts concerning plastic include its advocacy for the Consumer Goods Forum’s Golden Design Rules, which seek to increase the value of PET recycling, eliminate ‘problematic’ materials from packaging production, downsize packaging designs to their necessary components, and more.
It is also a member of the Business Coalition for a UN Plastics Treaty, through which it calls for an ‘ambitious, effective and legally binding’ treaty with the ultimate goal of ending plastic pollution. The company expresses its desire for ongoing negotiations to end with a ratified agreement this year.
In line with its Deforestation Position, Mondelēz plans to ensure all the paper used to produce packaging is sustainably sourced by the end of 2025, utilizing chain of custody certification programmes.
Further efforts included a partnership between its Philadelphia brand and Too Good To Go in 2024. Consumers in Austria, Germany, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland were encouraged to buy food just before it goes to waste, with Mondelēz attempting to address uncertainty caused by best-before dates by printing an ‘Often Good After’ logo on its packaging.
Reportedly, the company ran workshops and training for its local market and brand teams to further implement its Global Sustainable Packaging Strategy into business strategies and roadmaps and help drive locally relevant programmes for sustainability-minded packaging.
Steps were also taken to prevent potential human rights risks faced by its US suppliers, including packaging suppliers, under its AIM-Progress initiative. In 2024, it apparently developed and published resources for avoiding child labour and tackling root causes.
In similar news, L’Oréal Groupe has also fallen 51% short of its 100% recyclable, reusable, refillable, or compostable plastic packaging target for 2025. However, the company maintains that it utilizes “a significant proportion of recycled materials, including plastic, glass, paper and aluminium”, and that “refills are available on the major ranges of plastic bottles.”
For a deeper dive into multiple big brands and their alignment with sustainable packaging targets for 2025, check out our latest report on the top six FMCG signatories’ progress in the key metrics laid out by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation’s Global Commitment.
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