Westrock Coffee Co. recently released a new report focused on its current and future sustainability and corporate responsibility initiatives.
The 2024 Sustainability Report highlights the company’s progress toward its sustainability goals over the past year, celebrating milestones across initiatives and programs designed to benefit millions of smallholder farmers in its global supply chain — advancing economic empowerment and promoting environmental stewardship.
The Arkansas-based company, which provides coffee, tea, beverage extracts, flavors and ingredients and other beverage solutions for many of the top brands in retail/convenience store, foodservice, restaurant, CPG and hospitality industries, was founded on core values of responsible business and supply chain transparency.
“Westrock Coffee entered the coffee business in 2009 to challenge industry norms and build a better future for the entire supply chain,” said Brooke Cantrell, vice president of sustainability at Westrock Coffee Co. “This report highlights our progress and achievements in expanding sustainability efforts over the past year, while also outlining our vision for the future.”
Notable progress highlights in the 2024 Westrock Coffee Sustainability Report include:
- Westrock Coffee’s Raíz Sustainability program, which celebrates 10 years of success effecting positive change on Latin American coffee farms in the form of sustainable agriculture, fair labor practices and equitable supply chains. Since the program began in 2015, over $8.5 million has been paid in farmer premiums to more than 6,800 participating Raíz farmers and agronomists have provided technical support in more than 67,000 farm visits, demonstrating the long-term economic, social and environmental impact of Raíz Sustainability.
- The company’s investment in sustainable manufacturing by opening the world’s largest roast to ready-to-drink (RTD) plant in North America in 2024. This state-of-the-art facility has the capacity to recycle more than one billion gallons of water annually and uses roasters that require 40% less energy than average, while roasting double the amount of coffee.
- Westrock Coffee made significant progress towards achieving its goal of offering 100% responsibly sourced coffee and tea by the end of 2025, with 89% responsibly sourced coffee and 100% responsibly sourced tea by the end of 2024. The company also audited strategic suppliers for compliance with Westrock Coffee’s Responsible Sourcing Policy and expanded it’s Real Roots entry level sustainability sourcing program.
In addition to highlighting progress toward current goals, Westrock Coffee’s 2024 report also details the company’s sustainability strategy and vision for 2030. Among its goals over the next five years, Westrock Coffee aims to increase transparency and traceability, expand economic programming in coffee producing countries to empower smallholder farmers and bolster the company’s sustainable supply chain and ecosystems.
“We’re setting our 2030 sustainability strategy at a time when the global sustainability conversation has become convoluted,” said Cantrell. “We have a clear vision of the impact that sustainability will have on our business and the overall industry, and strive to meet these goals over the next five years.”
To view the full 2024 Westrock Coffee Sustainability Report, click here.
