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Nestlé announced today that it has reached an agreement to sell its U.S. ice cream business to Froneri, an ice cream-focused joint venture Nestlé created in 2016 with PAI Partners, for a transaction value of USD 4 billion.

In 2016, Nestlé and PAI Partners merged Nestlé’s European ice cream business in 20 countries and PAI-owned R&R to create Froneri, one of the world’s largest ice cream companies.

With a portfolio of iconic brands, unparalleled ice cream knowledge and focus as well as an agile and entrepreneurial management style, Froneri has been able to achieve rapid sales and profit growth, steadily gaining market share and reaching a turnover of around CHF 2.9 billion in 2018.

Froneri, which already had operations in Europe, Latin America, Africa and Asia-Pacific will now have a strong presence in the U.S., the largest ice cream market in the world. The recent acquisitions of TipTop in New Zealand and Nestlé’s ice cream business in Israel have also increased Froneri’s growing global footprint.

Nestlé USA's successful ice cream business comes with a high-caliber management team, marketing, manufacturing and sales/distribution capabilities. In 2018, turnover was USD 1.8 billion. With brands like Häagen-Dazs, Drumstick and Outshine, the business commands leadership in key ice cream categories, notably super premium.

Commenting on the transaction, Mark Schneider, Nestlé CEO, said: "The creation of Froneri has been a phenomenal success. We are now making this business our global strategic partner in ice cream and are convinced that Froneri’s successful business model can be extended to the U.S. market. With this transaction, we are taking a decisive step towards our goal of achieving global leadership in ice cream."

Read the full press release

Nestlé has today reported significant progress in its efforts to tackle the issue of child labor in the cocoa communities of West Africa. Its latest 'Tackling Child Labor' report (pdf, 4Mb) shows that it is possible to have a positive impact at scale. Providing education — for both children and adults — and improving livelihoods remain crucial to prevent and stop child labor.

In 2012, Nestlé took an important step to help vulnerable children in the cocoa sector by pioneering its Child Labor Monitoring and Remediation System. This system allows Nestlé to identify, track and address child labor in its supply chains. Assistance is provided through community-wide solutions as well as those tailored to individual needs.

Over the past two years, Nestlé has almost doubled its outreach to include 78,580 children across 1,750 communities. In the development phase of the system from 2012 to 2017, Nestlé monitored over 40,000 children in Côte d’Ivoire and identified 7,002 as child laborers.

The system continues to be successful in identifying children involved in child labor, with over 18,000 children found. Through awareness raising and assistance, 55% of these children have been able to stop child labor activities. Nestlé will continue its efforts to provide solutions for all the children identified.

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Meatless is going mainstream, as two of America's beloved brands are getting even more awesome. Nestlé is launching new meatless DiGiorno and Stouffer’s innovations made with Sweet Earth Awesome Grounds, a plant-based ground beef alternative.

DiGiorno Rising Crust Meatless Supreme pizza with Sweet Earth Awesome Grounds and Stouffer's Meatless Lasagna with Sweet Earth Awesome Grounds will help satisfy consumers looking for convenient and meat-free options from brands they know and trust. Similar to the original offerings with real meat, these new recipes have the same high product quality, taste and texture.

Consumers are increasingly showing interest in adopting a 'flexitarian' lifestyle — making an active choice to incorporate more plant-based meals into their diets, while occasionally eating meat or fish. In recent years, the demand for meals made with meat alternatives has gone mainstream.

Launching more plant-based food and beverages is part of Nestlé's efforts to speed up the transformation of its portfolio with innovative, sustainable products.

For more, read the press release

Nestlé today announced the launch of a more inclusive and enhanced global parental support policy.

The new gender-neutral policy will apply to all employees worldwide. Under the new policy, parental leave for primary caregivers will be extended to 18 weeks of fully paid leave from 14 weeks previously. The policy establishes a minimum of four weeks for secondary caregivers, for whom there was no global minimum before.

Nestlé CEO Mark Schneider said: "Every family is unique, so we have designed a parental support policy that is flexible enough to work for us all. Supporting the healthy development of infants has been a core value of our company since our founding. Our new parental support policy is an important part of our efforts to provide children with the best start in life, by allowing parents to spend more time with their new child."

The new policy sets new minimum standards but does not set limits. This means that in some places, Nestlé may choose to offer more leave than the 18 weeks for primary caregivers and the four weeks for secondary caregivers. The company will always provide longer parental leave if local laws require it.

In addition to the new arrangements, the parental support policy reinforces employment protection, non-discrimination, health protection, the availability of flexible working options, as well as breastfeeding support.

Nestlé Head of Group Human Resources Béatrice Guillaume-Grabisch said: "We want to make Nestlé an even more inclusive and inspiring place to work. This is a policy that will benefit every one of our people when they welcome a new child to their family, wherever they are in the world."

Nestlé will begin implementing the policy in 2020, with the global rollout set to be completed by the end of 2022.

Nestlé has today launched the KitKat Chocolatory Cacao Fruit Chocolate, the first product to use a unique chocolate made entirely from the cocoa fruit.

The iconic crispy KitKat wafer is coated with a 70% dark chocolate that uses the beans and pulp from the cocoa fruit as the only ingredients.

This exclusive confectionery will be available in Japan for online purchase and in the KitKat Chocolatory boutiques in Tokyo, Osaka, Kawasaki and Hiroshima. It comes individually or in an assortment box with other KitKat Chocolatory Sublime bars.

The launch of the KitKat Chocolatory Cacao Fruit Chocolate follows the announcement in July of the breakthrough to sweeten chocolate solely with cocoa pulp.

Cocoa pulp surrounds the cocoa beans, and is soft, sweet and white in color. Nestlé has developed a natural approach that allows it to extract the pulp and use it in chocolate, with no compromise on taste, texture and quality.

Further products sweetened with cocoa pulp will follow in other countries next year, through some of Nestlé's most popular confectionery brands.

Nestlé has introduced a number of confectionery innovations through KitKat in Japan, such as ruby chocolate and volcanic chocolate.

For more details on the launch in Japan, read the press release (pdf, 500Kb)

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Nestlé Purina, in collaboration with Ashoka (a pioneer in the field of social entrepreneurship), has announced the launch of the second BetterwithPets Prize, which offers up to CHF 120,000 to social innovators who are harnessing the power of the pet-human bond.

New for this second edition are two application streams and an expanded geographical scope. Purina is on the search for social innovations both piloted/implemented and idea-stage that are focused on harnessing the mutual positive power of the pet-human bond for the health and wellbeing of society. The latter stream, idea-stage innovations, is specifically aimed at young innovators, from 18 to 25 years old.

Now accessible to more countries across Europe, Middle East and North Africa, the 2020 Prize application process will be open from November 25, 2019 and will close on January 28, 2020.

Applicants for the Purina BetterwithPets Prize will get the chance to win prizes totalling CHF 120,000, up to CHF 100,000 for piloted/implemented innovations and up to CHF 20,000 for idea-stage innovations. In addition, the finalists from the piloted/implemented innovations stream will be eligible to participate in an accelerator program whereas the finalists from idea-stage innovations will have the opportunity to participate in a co-creation lab, both designed to support finalists in the development of their projects.

A total of ten finalists will be invited to attend the Purina BetterwithPets Forum in France on 3-4 June 2020, where the winners will be announced.

Nestlé today announced that it will use Nutri-Score nutrition labeling in Austria, Belgium, France, Germany and Switzerland, starting in the first half of 2020. The company will implement Nutri-Score across brands of its wholly-owned businesses over a two-year period.

Cereal Partners Worldwide, the international breakfast venture between Nestlé and General Mills, will also implement Nutri-Score on its product packaging in the same countries.

In total, more than 5000 products in the five countries will feature Nutri-Score.

Nutri-Score is a voluntary front-of-pack scheme that classifies foods and beverages according to their nutritional profile. It is a color-coded system with a scale ranging from A (healthier choices) to E (less healthy choices).

Marco Settembri, CEO of Nestlé for Europe, Middle East and North Africa said: "Our ambition is to have one of the healthiest options in every product category we offer. Nutri-Score will motivate us and help track our progress. I am proud that Nestlé is the first company to roll out Nutri-Score at this scale in Europe. We now want to move quickly as we are sure this is the right way forward."

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Nestlé strengthened its commitment and leadership in tackling the issue of plastic waste by joining the New Plastics Economy as a core partner.

Applying the principles of the circular economy, the initiative - led by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation - brings together key stakeholders to rethink and redesign the future of plastics, starting with packaging.

Véronique Cremades-Mathis, Global Head of Sustainable Packaging at Nestlé, said: "Collaboration and collective action are critical to achieving system-wide change to the way we think about and engage with plastics. At Nestlé, we don't want any of our packaging, including plastics, to become waste or pollution. The New Plastics Economy initiative represents an important catalyst on the journey to achieving a circular economy for plastics, and we are pleased to be able to contribute to this work through our expanded role as a core partner."

Nestlé is also a signatory of the New Plastics Economy Global Commitment, which unites more than 400 organizations behind a common vision and targets to address plastic waste and pollution at its source.

Read the full announcement.

Nestlé Purina PetCare Company today marked the opening of its 21st factory in the United States in Hartwell, Georgia.

With a total investment of more than USD 320 million (CHF 317 million), the new Hartwell factory is Purina's first new U.S. factory in two decades. Currently nearly 200 employees work at the Hartwell facility, and the number will grow to 240 as new lines and other expansions at the site are completed over the next few years.

The modern facility is built on the site of a long-idled textile facility. It will produce trusted Purina brands including Fancy Feast, which is the top wet cat food brand in the U.S.

Purina first announced its investment in Hartwell in 2017 and began initial operations of a distribution center at the site in spring 2018.

For more information, read the press release.

Starting today, on America Recycles Day, Nespresso, the New York City Department of Sanitation (DSNY), and Sims Municipal Recycling (SMR) encourage New Yorkers to recycle their Nespresso coffee capsules and other lightweight aluminum items through the City’s curbside program. New Yorkers can now recycle all small aluminum products in the same recycling bin as they do plastic, glass, and other materials. This initiative makes it possible for even more of these articles to take on a second life and eventually transform into new products, such as automotive parts and soda cans.

Earlier in 2019, Nespresso committed USD1.2 million to improve the recovery of small aluminum and better allow for the curbside recycling of its coffee capsules in New York City. In most cities, the size and light weight of such items, including foil and house keys, require that they be divided from other mixed metals using special equipment. With this program, SMR invested in new technology to better sort and capture these articles, increasing the efficacy of the City’s recycling system.

"We make our capsules from aluminum because it’s a fully recyclable metal and it is an excellent material for preserving the quality of our coffee," said Guillaume Le Cunff, President and CEO of Nespresso USA. "We are constantly innovating to make recycling easier for Nespresso customers and to contribute new solutions to all recycling challenges, and we’re excited to help improve recovery in New York City and lessen the amount of all kinds of aluminum in our landfills today."

This collaboration with DSNY and SMR supports New York City’s Zero Waste initiative. It has the potential to reduce the 43,000 tons of aluminum foil and other mixed metals that currently end up in local landfills each year.

Read the full press release

This week in Buenos Aires, young entrepreneurs from Latin America are seeing if their projects can make a difference and contribute to the Sustainable Development Goals.

Ten finalist teams in the 'Comprometidos' Challenge are participating in a week of acceleration in Buenos Aires. They will receive expert mentoring from Nestlé, training, and the opportunity to exchange with other Latin American young people with whom they share the enthusiasm to change the world.

Nestlé is partnering with Ashoka, the world’s leading network of social entrepreneurs, as well as Socialab and UNESCO, to organize the 'Comprometidos' Challenge. Teams of young people were invited to find solutions to sustainable packaging, education, digital transformation and agripreneurship. More than 700 projects were submitted.

Since 2013, the Nestlé Needs YOUth initiative is a Nestlé commitment aimed at contributing to the preparation and training of the next generations. The Nestlé Needs YOUth initiative - 'Comprometidos' Challenge supports the Nestlé Needs YOUth initiative and its global ambition to help 10 million young people around the world have access to economic opportunities by 2030.

For more, visit the Nestlé Argentina website (in Spanish)

Nestlé today joined a coalition of major palm oil producers and buyers to support and fund the development of a new, publicly available radar-based forest monitoring system known as Radar Alerts for Detecting Deforestation (RADD).

Since the end of 2018, Nestlé has been monitoring 100% of its global palm oil supply chains using Starling, a monitoring system using optical and radar satellites. This allows the company to manage risks and perform field intervention strategies to drive changes.

Today’s move is a step further to realize Nestlé’s no deforestation commitment by contributing to industry transformation through publicly accessible monitoring system. “No longer can anyone claim to be unaware of the deforestation risks around their supply chains,” said Benjamin Ware, Global Head of Responsible Sourcing, Nestlé.

Developed by Wageningen University and Satelligence, and facilitated by World Resources Institute, RADD is the first radar-based monitoring system of this scale that will make deforestation alerts publicly available. Alerts will be made available on Global Forest Watch and Global Forest Watch Pro.

“We take an integrated approach in addressing the risks of deforestation, combining tools like certification, supply chain mapping, on-the-ground verification and satellite monitoring,” said Benjamin. “We are pleased to support the development of forest monitoring system like RADD as it will bring accountability and transparency across the industry.”

The open nature of the system will enable companies - plus governments, civil society organizations and concerned stakeholders - to monitor forests using the same information source and standards.

Nestlé is committed to having deforestation-free products. As of April 2019, 77% of the key agricultural commodities Nestlé buys, including palm oil, were verified deforestation-free. That figure will surpass 90% by the end of 2020. Nestlé will continue to work with smallholder farmers and large suppliers alike to be close to 100% deforestation-free within the next three years.

Read the full press release.

Nestlé has today inaugurated its first Gerber NutriPuffs cereal snacks plant in Shuangcheng District, Harbin City, Heilongjiang Province, China.

With an investment of around RMB 100 million (approx. CHF 14 million), the launch is an important milestone for Gerber in China.

The factory will produce organic and regular Gerber NutriPuffs, with a total of eight flavors. They will come in cans and flexible packaging that are 100% recyclable, in line with Nestlé's commitment to make all its packaging reusable or recyclable by 2025.

Gerber has a range of baby foods already available in China including infant cereal, fruit and vegetable puree, and baby snacks. Currently, Gerber is the No. 1 brand of infant cereal in China market.

For more, please read the press release (pdf, 100Kb)

Today, Nestlé and its regional partners have announced the launch of the ‘Regional Alliance for YOUth’ in sub-Saharan Africa. This joint effort is part of the company’s business-driven movement ‘Alliance for YOUth’ with a focus on creating and implementing employability programs, mentorship and training designed to equip young people with essential workplace skills.

This launch comes at a time when young people face significant challenges. Today’s youth is the largest the world has ever seen. According to the United Nations, young people aged 15-24 account for one out of every six people globally, with 20% of the total youth population living in Africa alone. This demographic trend goes along with increased unemployment rate among youth. In sub-Saharan Africa, it reached nearly 30% in 2016, as a report by the International Labour Organization shows. Without a concerted action, it is expected that nearly 50% of youth in the region will be unemployed by 2025.

The 'Regional Alliance for YOUth’ was formally introduced in Côte d’Ivoire today. It will also be launched in Angola and South Africa on October 31^st and November 4^th respectively. The initial ‘Alliance for YOUth’ was founded by Nestlé in Europe in 2014 and ever since rolled out over several geographical regions.

Read the full press release (pdf, 400Kb)

Gerber, the early childhood nutrition leader in the U.S., has partnered with international recycling company TerraCycle to help give hard-to-recycle baby food packaging a new life. The program is free of charge for consumers and rolled out on a national scale.

Parents simply sign up on the Gerber Recycling Program page and mail in packaging that is not municipally recyclable using a prepaid shipping label. Once collected, the packaging is cleaned and melted into hard plastic that can be remolded to make new recycled products.

The partnership is rooted in Gerber and TerraCycle’s shared values around eliminating waste and supports the recovery of hard-to-recycle baby food packaging nationwide. It is one of many steps toward Nestlé’s goal to make 100% of its packaging recyclable or reusable by 2025.

Read the full press release

According to the International Labor Organization, one out of five young people in Latin America cannot find employment. Reason enough for Nestlé and 58 partner companies to reaffirm their 'Mercosur Youth Employability Agreement' to young people from Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay. On the occasion of the second Mercosur Youth Summit in São Paulo, Brazil, the coalition committed to providing 45,000 professional development opportunities by the end of 2020 – 5,000 more than initially envisaged in the ‘Mercosur Youth Employability Agreement’ signed last year in Montevideo.

"We continuously invest in the next generation of talents in order to provide them with the skillset that will be required for the jobs of the future", Laurent Freixe, Nestlé CEO for the Americas, said. "We want young people to become successful innovators, entrepreneurs and creators regardless of their field or level of expertise."

Under Nestlé’s leadership, the 'Mercosur Youth Employability Agreement' was launched in 2018 during the first Mercosur Youth Summit in Montevideo, Uruguay, bringing together companies from the private sector, the International Youth Organization for Ibero-America (OIJ) and the governments of the four Mercosur countries to promote youth employability and entrepreneurship.

Read the full press release (pdf, 300Kb)