Coca-Cola HBC joins The Living Danube Partnership

Coca-Cola HBC is proud to announce that it’s joining The Living Danube Partnership (LDP) to help nature and communities thrive along the River Danube.

The company will partner with WWF-CEE and The Coca-Cola Foundation after they extended the LDP for another three years to increase climate and water resilience in the Danube basin.

Coca-Cola HBC will support the LDP to demonstrate and promote good water stewardship and explore additional opportunities for collective action. The Coca-Cola Foundation is supporting the programme with US $1.53 million, and Coca-Cola Europe has also joined the LDP.

The River Danube flows through six of Coca-Cola HBC’s markets that are covered by the partnership: Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic.

The partnership will do the following:

·        Focus on building on the water resilience work done in many of these countries during the first phase of the partnership.

·        Expand the scope of the programme from nature restoration towards community resilience, including interventions in agriculture and urban areas.

Previously, many projects were in remote and rural areas. New project work will include sites in Hungary (upper Tisza floodplain) and Czech Republic (Krušné Mountains).

Marcel Martin, Coca-Cola HBC’s Chief Corporate Affairs and Sustainability Officer, says: “The Living Danube Partnership closely aligns with our own strategic commitments on water within our Mission 2025 targets. The River Danube is vital to nature and communities across Europe. Through this partnership we have achieved and learnt a lot over the last eight years. It is excellent to now move from conservation to restoration to have a lasting impact across the region.”

Andreas Beckmann, the WWF-CEE CEO says: "Intense floods, droughts, and heatwaves are already devastating parts of Europe, at an immense cost to communities, business and nature. We need to work hand in hand with nature, not against it, to overcome these challenges. Our focus must extend beyond conservation to the restoration of ecosystems and biodiversity, including rivers and wetlands.

“To achieve meaningful change at scale, collective action is essential. Our shared vision for a Living Danube, where both people and nature thrive, has once again united us with The Coca-Cola Foundation and now with and Coca-Cola in Europe and Coca-Cola HBC to continue building resilience for communities vulnerable to water-related climate risks, while improving watershed health in the Danube basin."

·        Read more about The Living Danube Partnership

·        Our sustainability journey | at a glance | Coca-Cola HBC (coca-colahellenic.com)