Economic Opportunity

In addition to our economic “ripple,” we also support local economies through targeted initiatives that offer opportunity to the people and places that need it most. Here is a progress report on our most recent efforts.

5 BY 20

In September 2010, we launched our commitment to 5 BY 20—an effort to economically empower 5 million women entrepreneurs in our global value chain by 2020. 5 BY 20 aims to enable women entrepreneurs to break down social and economic barriers by providing them with access to skills training, financial services and support networks of peers and mentors. We define “entrepreneur” as virtually any woman connected with our business, including farmers, shopkeepers, micro-distributors, recycling collectors and artisans.

We recognize that we cannot meet 5 BY 20’s ambitious goal single-handedly. That is why we are partnering with governments, NGOs, banks and other companies. By pooling our experience with that of our partners, we can have a profound and lasting impact.

5 BY 20 is already under way in many countries, with an initial focus on four important growing markets: Brazil, India, the Philippines and South Africa. Our business units in these countries are leading the way by embedding 5 BY 20 in their business plans and processes. We have also begun building on existing initiatives, such as our residential entrepreneurship-training program in Brazil, our mobile retail training centers in India and our support of women retailers in South Africa.

Reaching out to women is logical for us because women are not only pillars of their communities but also pillars of our business, making up a disproportionately high percentage of key segments of our value chain. In some markets, women own or operate 85 percent of the small neighborhood stores that sell our products. As we move toward our goal of doubling our business by 2020, small-scale retailers and distributors will be an important contributor to our success. So our initial 5 BY 20 activities will focus on women in these roles. By investing in their success, we invest in our own.

What is more, unleashing the entrepreneurial potential of women is one of the most effective and sustainable ways we can help more families and communities prosper. Empowering women will also provide more choices for women and help create female role models in places where economic opportunities for women have historically been limited.

Micro Distribution Centers

For more than a decade, we have grown both our business and local economies through our Micro Distribution Centers (MDCs)—small product distribution centers managed by local people in developing countries. MDCs help us do business in hard-to-reach communities while supporting local economies. In exchange, we offer assistance to independent entrepreneurs.

Our original MDC model was developed in Africa, and in many African countries MDCs account for the majority of sales. Currently, in Africa there are more than 3,200 MDCs that employ over 19,000 people, generating more than $950 million in annual revenue.

Many MDCs are in high-density areas, where a lack of good roads and infrastructure makes it difficult for delivery trucks to travel. MDCs in Kenya, Mozambique, Tanzania and Uganda account for the vast majority of our sales in those countries. The number of MDCs in North and West Africa is growing rapidly.

More than 800 of our African MDCs are owned and managed by women, and an additional 800 are co-owned by women. In fact, more than half of the new MDCs created since 2009 are owned and run by women. In faster-growing markets like Ghana and Nigeria, female ownership exceeds 70 percent.

Since joining the Business Call to Action in 2008, our system has created more than 1,100 new MDCs, which in turn has generated more than 11,500 new jobs. Working with various external partners, we also researched ways to improve the development impacts of the MDC model and shared this learning across our system. We have seen similar expressions of the MDC model introduced in China and the Philippines. We expect that as our business grows toward 2020, micro-distributors will continue to play an increasing role in our overall route-to-market strategies.

Project Nurture

We expect our juice business to grow significantly by 2020. To make sure we can source enough juice to meet that target—and to help improve the livelihoods of fruit farmers—we formed Project Nurture, an innovative four-year, $11.5 million partnership with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and TechnoServe. Project Nurture is intended to double the farming incomes of more than 50,000 small-scale farmers in Kenya and Uganda by 2014 by increasing production of mango and passion fruit suitable for both the fresh fruit and juice markets. Our East Africa business unit will invest a total of $4 million in the project, along with $1.5 million in in-kind contributions, including infrastructure investment, technical expertise and fruit purchases.

Through Project Nurture, local farmers—many of them women—will gain a market for their fruit. Consumers will be able to support their local farmers through the purchase of beverages. And our business will benefit from procuring locally produced fruit, lowering our costs and increasing supply chain flexibility.

To date, 36,722 farmers have been trained through Project Nurture. More than 13,550 metric tons of fresh fruit from Project Nurture farms have been sold to date. In late 2010, we launched Minute Maid Mango Nectar in Kenya. It is the first product to use juice sourced from Project Nurture.

Haiti Hope

Based on our Project Nurture model, the Haiti Hope Project is a five-year, $9.5 million partnership intended to double the incomes of 25,000 Haitian mango farmers. Our partners in the project include the Multilateral Investment Fund (MIF), a member of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and TechnoServe. The Clinton Bush Haiti Fund, the Soros Economic Development Fund and others are among the supporters of the Project. Our Project team works closely with Haitian authorities to make sure the Project’s goals align with the government’s.

We began implementing Haiti Hope in September 2010, nine months after Haiti’s catastrophic earthquake. Since then, the Project team has established relationships with farmer groups representing thousands of mango farmers. As of August 31, 2011, 6,000 mango farmers have joined the program, of which 40 percent are women. This total surpasses the goal of enrolling 5,000 farmers by September of the same year. The Project team has also implemented a comprehensive farmer-training program.

The Coca‐Cola Company has pledged to invest $3.5 million to the Project over a five-year period. As part of Coca‐Cola’s overall contribution, in January 2011, our Odwalla brand launched Haiti Hope Mango Tango and pledged to donate 10 cents for every bottle sold, up to half a million dollars a year for the duration of the Project. To date, our Company has invested a total of $1.4 million in Haiti Hope.