Tetra Pak Sustainability Report FY22: Social Sustainability
Respecting human rights across our value chain
Global value chains depend on people, and people depend on global value chains for their income, livelihoods, and wellbeing. Businesses may exacerbate the vulnerability of these people through their operations and value chain or enhance their resilience and create better outcomes by proactively respecting human rights.
Today, the rights of workers, communities and other people affected by business activity are at risk, with increasing rates of forced labour, child labour and extreme poverty amongst other challenges1. The abuse of workers’ rights was severe in 20222, with only 3 out of 148 countries showing improvements in this area3. Meanwhile, the UN estimates that 7,500 people on average die every day from unsafe and unhealthy working conditions4. The climate crisis, and the necessary transition to a net-zero economy, exacerbate the risks to people across the value chain, whether in the form of lost livelihoods from extreme weather events and rising temperatures, or loss of employment from a rapid shift away from carbon-intensive practices.
In recent years, social sustainability has gained increasing attention from businesses, consumers, regulators, and civil society. One of the most prominent trends is the emphasis on promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in the workplace. While progress has been made in increasing the proportion of women in leadership roles, with the share reaching 36.9% in 2022 across 155 countries and 19 industries, equal representation has not been achieved across all industries5. In addition to promoting DEI, companies and its employees, benefit from protecting and promoting mental health at work, as depression and anxiety result in approximately 12 billion lost working days each year6.
Why it matters
People's income, livelihoods, and wellbeing are impacted by global value chains. While businesses can worsen people's vulnerability, respecting human rights can increase their resilience. However, the increasing incidence of forced labour, extreme poverty, and unsafe working conditions threaten the rights of workers and communities.
Ambition
To respect human rights across our operations and value chain, creating positive social impact7.
Targets
- Create action plans to address salient human rights risks across our value chain, along with targets and KPIs
- Continue to deliver wellbeing programmes for employees, support a positive and open safety culture across the company, and work towards reducing accidents and work-related ill health, with zero as the ultimate goal
- Continue to invest in training on inclusive leadership for managers and mentoring programmes driving gender equity and inclusiveness
- Sustain investment in Future Talent Programmes and enable world-class training and development for all our employees
Tetra Pak’s role
Tetra Pak’s promise to protect food, people and the planet is ever more relevant. Social sustainability means putting people first and implementing business practices that contribute to the human dimensions of sustainable development. Operating in the food and beverage packaging and processing industry, we recognise the importance of promoting social sustainability throughout our value chain and focus on our own workforce, workers and communities in our supply chain, and workers in collection and recycling of packaging.
We are committed to respecting human rights across our operations and value chain, in line with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights8, and creating positive social impact. By positive impact we mean driving better outcomes for our workforce, workers and communities in our supply chain, workers in collection and recycling and people in our value chain in the areas of labour, discrimination, hazardous working conditions and sustainable income, among others. We aim to strengthen our human rights due diligence processes, continually assess and take action to prevent human rights issues across our value chain, and enable remedy when harm does occur. Through this process, we aim to empower and listen to affected stakeholders, with their views informing business decisions around social sustainability.
Our progress in 2022
Supporting a culture based on health, safety, and wellbeing
Our occupational health and safety (OHS) initiatives ensure safe working conditions everywhere for our employees. Additionally, we have established a mental wellbeing programme, which provides employees with the relevant tools, training, and support services to raise awareness, de-stigmatise mental health issues in the workplace, and support employees’ mental health whenever and wherever needed.
In 2022, we had zero fatalities and only one high-consequence incident, across our sites globally. We ensure that all high consequence incidents have subsequent detailed action plans to drive improvements to prevent reoccurrence. In 2022 we also achieved a 19% reduction in our Total Recordable Accident Rate compared to 20219 continuing the trend from 2020. Our continued efforts on OHS over the past few years have been contributing to this positive development. As an example, we have continued the implementation of the global software platform My OHS, to deliver OHS support to our employees and agency workers, and we launched a virtual course to further raise OHS competency in key positions.
Many of our sites also focus on employee health and wellbeing more broadly, from offering regular hearing and eyesight tests, routine vaccinations, and ergonomic risk assessments, to stress management programmes, complementary therapies, advice on nutrition and healthy living, and alcohol and drug support.
As part of our aim to improve global employee mental wellbeing, we have launched a campaign helping employees recognise symptoms of poor mental wellbeing in themselves or their colleagues and tools to help them make changes to improve the situation. The campaign worked alongside the global Employee Assistance Programme, which is open to all employees and their families should they need emotional support or counselling.
In 2022, over 3,000 employees accessed and engaged with our Mental Wellbeing portal with an additional 3,200 completing our training programme, including the resilience training we launched the same year. Based on our employee engagement survey we now start seeing a positive trend in number of employees who say they feel comfortable in talking about their mental wellbeing at Tetra Pak.
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Promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI)
We strive for a truly diverse workforce, and a culture of inclusion, where every employee is valued, included, engaged, offered fair opportunities, and treated equally irrespective of their backgrounds. This includes, but is not limited to gender, age, race, ethnic origin, sexual orientation, and disability.
Building gender equality
We continue to see progress in the representation of women among Tetra Pak employees: the number of women in senior positions increased to 22% in 2022, compared to 18% in 2021, and 14% in 2020. Women now represent 56% of participants in mentoring programmes, 38% of participants in our Leadership Accelerated Programme (LAP), and 31% of employees in our succession bench.
In 2022, we enhanced our focus on increasing the share of female workers in our factories. To increase the rate of women being hired in factories, we identified a list of enablers, such as adapting working patterns (e.g., facility requirements, shift patterns), onboarding for newly hired women, and training for people leaders who will lead women for the first time. Implementing these enablers has resulted in local improvements, one example being our factory in Chakan, India, where the number of female engineers increased from zero to five in 2022, when focusing on attracting women to our Future Talent Programme.
It's great to be a part of a change where we're breaking stereotypes and Tetra Pak is surely playing a major role in doing so by providing diversity, equity, inclusion and giving female engineers a chance to showcase their knowledge and talent.
Vandita Patil,
WCM Engineer
One of five women hired to our Chakan factory in 2022 as part of the Future Talent Programme
I have seen the opinion and work of each person being equally valued. Here, knowledge is welcomed, independently of whom it comes from.
Nikita Sutar,
Quality Engineer
One of five women hired to our Chakan factory in 2022 as part of the Future Talent Programme
Developing diverse talents and fostering inclusion
As part of our wider DEI strategy, in 2022 we have trained an additional 150 leaders through our Inclusive Leadership training which aims to create awareness of individual biases and to foster an inclusive environment. Since the launch in 2019, over 60% (1,800) of people leaders have gone through the programme. Additionally, we further expanded participation in the Gender Equity cross-company mentoring programme to 50 mentoring pairs in 2021, compared to 17 pairs in 2020. The programme is delivered by Moving Ahead and matches Tetra Pak women to more senior mentors from other companies. We also re-launched the Tetra Pak global mentoring programme, growing from 20 mentoring pairs in the last edition to 78 today. This is a 10-month programme to strengthen the leadership capability of emerging leaders, preparing them for future roles, and increasing their exposure to different functions, units and cultures.
Deploying initiatives via our local and regional DEI Panels
Our DEI organisational model involves employees across the organisation at the global, regional, and local level. Our Global DEI panel, sponsored by Executive Leadership Team (ELT) members, provides strategic directions, defines a global roadmap, and offers support. Across the organisation we have regional and local DEI panels to better drive actions and address issues at the local level and drive accountability.
- In Brazil, the DEI team has been active since 2020, with more than 20 passionate employees. As a first step, they validated an action plan based on embedding our code of conduct, focusing on psychological safety, creating DEI allies, and running a DEI survey to create a more specific action plan for targeted employees. The census allowed the team to map the population, identify gaps for specific minority groups and define the key priorities for the market, which resulted in initiatives focused on the female workforce: how to hire and promote more women; inclusion for people with disabilities and people in the LGBTQ+ community; how to increase the representation of people of colour; and DEI informal discussions.
Talent attraction, development, and engagement
At Tetra Pak, every employee plays their part in delivering our strategy. Our investments in leadership and technical competencies – from recruitment to retirement – are therefore investments in the success of our business because they support productive careers with us. We offer competitive compensation and benefits packages10, opportunities for career growth, and a supportive and inclusive work environment to retain top talent.
Attracting new talent through our Future Talent Programme
We have several talent programmes to support the development and nurturing of our workforce and provide job opportunities for recent graduates. Our Future Talent Programme hired 103 talented and highly motivated new graduates in 2022 to become the next generation of engineers and leaders in Tetra Pak. The programme is currently operational in 45 countries and supports our Future Talents to develop, learn, and build a holistic view of Tetra Pak and a solid global network.
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As a Future Talent, you are constantly challenged while given the freedom and trust to work on meaningful projects. The network I have built over the last one and a half years will benefit me in my future role to find synergies and work with others across the businesses and value chain. Together we can for example raise sustainability as an important topic with our suppliers in direct (e.g. raw material for equipment) as well as indirect purchases (e.g. logistics and software) to make sure they follow the Tetra Pak guidelines and Business Code of Conduct regarding environmental and social sustainability.”
Karola Kremer,
Junior Supply Manager
Joined Tetra Pak and the Future Talent Programme in 2021
Building competencies by promoting learning and development
By promoting learning and sharing knowledge and experience across the business, we build a culture where competence is respected, recognised and rewarded. Employees can expect continuous learning and development, aligned to their personal goals and contributing to our corporate strategy. Regular performance evaluations11 are part of the company-wide review process and financial incentives are available to those meeting their goals, including environmental targets such as recycling rates and greenhouse gas emissions. We help our employees develop their competencies across corporate functions, from customer understanding, leadership and project management; to environmental and social sustainability.
Collecting and acting on feedback from employees
We regularly measure our employees’ engagement and collect feedback on multiple topics. For example, we run a large-scale employee engagement survey once every two years. This survey allows employees to rate how well the company performs in the different drivers of engagement. To complement the largescale survey, we run Employee Engagement Pulse surveys twice a year to give employees an opportunity to share feedback on specific topics, such as organisational changes or follow-up on findings from the large-scale survey.
Enabling leadership development
In response to our latest employee engagement survey, we created three learning programmes addressing specific developmental needs for our people leaders and individual contributors: Remote Leadership, Coaching, and Informal Leadership. These programmes are launched between November 2022 and May 2023. They utilise interactive methods of learning across a 2–4-month period and consist of on-the-job actions and experiments, virtual sessions, bite-sized self-paced digital learning, and peer coaching to provide a multi-faceted learning experience for participants.
In 2022 we launched “Energise”, a programme intended to support the leadership transformation in our factories. The programme was launched at 26 factories in 15 languages, where we trained over 400 leaders and facilitators on different leadership behaviours and challenges, in the context of the production floor. As a direct result of this, leaders and facilitators were able to deliver training workshops to 6,000+ production operators. Feedback provided by participants of our leadership development programmes stated that they believed our leadership curriculum would have a positive impact on their ability as a leader (NPS 4.6/5).
SustainABLE 2.0 training
In 2022 we launched the SustainABLE 2.0 e-learning journey, tailored to our frontline staff to increase awareness and knowledge on climate, circularity and nature, and feel confident to undertake informed discussions with food and beverage manufacturers, NGOs, and other external stakeholders on these topics.
With the SustainABLE 2.0 learning journey, I was able to gain meaningful insight into the global regulatory requirements on packaging, packaging waste, as well as our efforts in collection and recycling. Armed with this knowledge, within a week, I found myself discussing comfortably on these topics with the top management of one of our global customers. Such time-relevant and focused learning programmes boost the confidence of our customer facing teams (people like me).
Rajat Shah,
Services Director, Tetra Pak Thailand
Workers and communities in our supply chain
Our Responsible Sourcing Procedure sets out the requirements for all purchasing categories to manage risks in relation to human rights, labour practices, OHS, environment, and business integrity. As part of our commitment to respect human rights across our value chain, we assess and prioritise impacts on the people and the communities in our supply chain. We will address the most severe risks in our procurement of materials for our products, as well as the services we use.
Building our awareness and understanding of human rights issues
In 2022, we worked with Shift, a leading centre of expertise on the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs), to assess our approach to respecting human rights and how it can be further developed as part of our social sustainability strategy. As an outcome, we initiated a systematic risk identification process, to assess and prioritise risks to people across our value chain. For risks in our supply chain, this involved desk research, including reviewing suppliers’ disclosure, relevant reports from civil society, international institutions and the media, and assessing information on suppliers from Ecovadis, Sedex audits, and industry schemes such as the Aluminium Stewardship Initiative. This was complemented by interviews with a selection of external experts from NGOs and international institutions that could provide expertise and insight into the severe risks to human rights in key supply chains, through dialogue with strategic suppliers, as well as internal stakeholder interviews and workshops with category managers in our procurement function. Through this process, we assessed that the most severe risks that may occur to people in our supply chain could be as follows:
- Forced labour of workers and indigenous people’s rights in the extraction or cultivation of our base materials12
- Environmental impacts on the livelihoods of communities from the extraction of our base materials.
- Security of human rights and environmental defenders in some higher risk countries • Health and safety of workers in our base material suppliers’ production
- Working conditions of workers at our logistics providers
Workers in collection & recycling of packaging
We work at a local level to activate, accelerate, and transform the collection and recycling sector with a dedicated team of professionals which collaborate with recyclers, local authorities, and customers to advise on efficient collection and sorting schemes, and co-invest with industrial partners in the recycling value chain. As part of the efforts, we are seeking new ways to ensure safe and decent working conditions for people across the recycling value chain.
In 2022, we conducted a high-level mapping of the collection and recycling value chains for carton packages and assessed risks to people. As a next step, we will engage with informal waste collectors to inform market specific action plans in pilot countries.
Workers in collection & recycling of packaging By respecting collection and recycling workers’ rights, we aim to help increase incomes and livelihoods, provide protection in risky environments and give them a voice in the future of collection and recycling systems. We already collaborate with stakeholders to establish an environment where informal waste collectors in collection systems work and live with dignity. For example, in our projects in Brazil and India.
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Humanitarian assistance
We are working to further enhance our impact with a greater focus on the speed and type of response to humanitarian crises, providing assistance when required.
Ukraine
In December 2022, Tetra Laval, the group which comprises Tetra Pak, Sidel and DeLaval, donated power and heat generators to a value of €10 million as humanitarian aid to the people of Ukraine, currently suffering major power shortages as a result of the Russian war on Ukraine. This donation was in addition to the € 10 million already donated by Tetra Laval to Ukraine, since the start of the Russian invasion, through reputable aid organisations and through Tetra Pak’s customers to ensure safe food distribution in support of Ukraine and Ukrainian refugees outside the country.
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Pakistan
Tetra Pak Pakistan donated €100,000 to support the Pakistan Red Crescent Society (PRCS) in response to its emergency flood relief appeal. The assistance immediately required by flood victims is lifesaving, however, the impact of this flooding will be long-term. The significant loss to the livestock and agriculture sector will not only impact the livelihoods of those affected but also the food security situation of the country in the medium- and longterm. There is a dire need for all stakeholders to work together and adopt smart solutions.
The massive havoc caused by these floods has shattered these communities, driving millions out of their homes and into the open to face danger and disease like never witnessed before. For an efficient capacity building of relief efforts, we believe in serving our part by supporting a major humanitarian actor such as the Pakistan Red Crescent, which has been actively involved in driving relief efforts across the country with great financial diligence and use of local capacity.
Misbah Burney,
Finance Director, Tetra Pak Pakistan
Türkiye and Syria
In early 2023, Tetra Pak gave support for people affected by the earthquake in Türkiye and Syria. To help affected communities who are suffering from a lack of electricity, we supplied generators, particularly for the rescue teams in night shifts, hospitals and permanent shelters. This is in addition to local employee activities to support those most affected, including blood donation campaigns and the introduction of an employee voluntary donation campaign for urgently needed items. These activities were done in partnership with local non-profit organisations.
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Learn more about what is next for Tetra Pak here.
1 International Labour Organisation: 50 million people worldwide in modern slavery. (2022). Source: https://www.ilo.org/global/about-the-ilo/newsroom/news/WCMS_855019/lang--en/index.html
2 Global Rights Index 2022 Violations. (2022). Source: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/09/globalrights-index-2022-violations/
3 Global Rights Index 2022 Violations. (2022). Source: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/09/globalrights-index-2022-violations/
4 UN Global Compact: Labour and Decent Work. Source: https://www.unglobalcompact.org/what-is-gc/ our-work/social/labour
5 Leadership roles included in the sample are Director, VP, CXO, Partner. The sample includes data from 155 countries. Global Gender Gap Report. (2022). Source: https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_GGGR_2022.pdf
6 Source: https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/mental-health-at-work 7 By positive impact we mean driving better outcomes for our workforce, workers and communities in our supply chain, workers in collection and recycling and people in our value chain in the areas of labour, discrimination, hazardous working conditions and sustainable income, among others.
7 By positive impact we mean driving better outcomes for our workforce, workers and communities in our supply chain, workers in collection and recycling and people in our value chain affected by climate change and the transition to net-zero in the areas of labour, discrimination, hazardous working conditions and sustainable income, among others.
8 The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) are the global standard for business conduct concerning human rights. They're composed of 3 pillars: First, the state has a duty to protect people against human rights harm by business. It requires states to use all the tools at their disposal—law, policy, regulation, and adjudication—to protect against human rights harm by business. Second, businesses have a responsibility to respect human rights. That is, businesses should not infringe on human rights in their own operations, or in their business relationships (e.g. with partners, suppliers, and customers). That responsibility of businesses is much harder to realise when the state does not do its job, but the responsibility remains, nonetheless. Third, there is a need for greater access to remedy. This requires states & businesses to play roles in providing access to effective remedy—both judicial and non-judicial—for those harmed by business-related human rights abuse.
9 Data includes both employees and workers who are not employees when at a workplace under control of Tetra Pak.
10 The majority of our employees receive benefits including over and above statutory provisions such as; accident, death and disability coverage 2x Annual Base salary global standard, medical and pension plans positioned at market medians for each country, long service awards where market prevalent, redundancy benefits include typically above legally required severance payments as well as globally consistent outplacement services.
11 In 2022, 98% of employees had regular performance reviews.
12 Base materials are the materials we use to produce the packaging we sell to food and beverage producers, including paperboard, polymers, aluminium foil and inks.
