Coca Cola invests 6.5 mln Euro in France recycling joint venture

BEAUNE (Scrap Monster): The world's most valuable brand Coca-Cola Enterprises will invest €6.5 million in its joint venture with PET recycler APPE to expand a recycling facility in Beaune, France.

According to Coca-Cola, the investment will boost the capacity of the plastics reprocessing facility by 70% and enable it to recycle 20,000 additional tonnes of plastic into food-grade packaging per year. The investment will introduce "state-of-the-art technology, enabling more efficient recycling".

Coca-Cola will also fund a research project to examine how consumer behaviour change strategies can improve at-home recycling rates in Great Britain and France, which both lag behind many European countries.

"Our goal to lead our industry in sustainable packaging and recycling means we must support and promote improvements throughout our value chain," said John F Brock, the Chairman and Chief executive of Coca-Cola Enterprises.

"These initiatives aim to address two of our biggest challenges in this area - improving recycling rates by influencing consumer behavior at home and meeting the increasing demand for recycled PET through investments in strategic infrastructure projects," he added.

Coca-Cola Enterprises, which is the largest single Coca-Cola bottler in North America and western Europe.