By 2025, all of McDonald’s packaging will come from renewable recycled or certified sources, and aim to have recycling in all of their restaurants. This expands upon McDonald’s existing goal that by 2020 100 percent of fiber-based packaging will come from recycled or certified sources where no deforestation occurs.
“As the world’s largest restaurant company, we have a responsibility to use our scale for good to make changes that will have a meaningful impact across the globe,” Francesca DeBiase, McDonald’s Chief Supply Chain and Sustainability Officer said. “Our customers have told us that packaging waste is the top environmental issue they would like us to address. Our ambition is to make changes our customers want and to use less packaging, sourced responsibly and designed to be taken care of after use, working at and beyond our restaurants to increase recycling and help create cleaner communities.”
In order to reach these goals, McDonald’s plans on working with leading industry experts, local governments and environmental associations to improve packaging and recycling practices. Together they will work to have smarter packaging designers, implement new recycling programs, create new measurement programs and educate restaurant crews and customers.
McDonald’s first began its focus on sustainable packaging 25 years ago with their partnership with EDF. Together they eliminated more than 300 million pounds of packaging, recycled 1 million tons of corrugated boxes and reduced waste by 30 percent in 10 years.
Currently, 50 percent of McDonalds packaging comes from renewable and recycled material. Globally, 10 percent of McDonalds restaurants are recycling customer packaging.
To read the full press release, please click here.
