Hits, misses and revisions: the state of corporate water goals

AB InBev overcomes last-minute doubts to hit 2025 target, while German chemical firm and Swiss bottler announce misses

World Water Day brought with it the usual slew of corporate announcements over the weekend. 

Among the fluff were some interesting updates, and Real Economy Progress found others buried in recent sustainability reports. 

So here’s how firms have been getting on. 

There’s been plenty of positive news, starting with drinks giants PepsiCo and AB InBev both achieving their 2025 targets.  

In last year’s disclosures, InBev admitted it “may face challenges” getting its water use down to just double the amount of drink it produces, but it’s actually exceeded that goal (although it didn’t disclose whether it had indeed had to “think creatively” to do so). 

Its rivals Carlsberg and Heineken raised similar concerns last year, but both also made progress.  

Carlsberg has improved its water efficiency – though some of the gains may be driven by its acquisition of Britvic in January, which has less water intensive production processes.  

Despite the improvements, it announced weakened targets earlier this month: it’s now aiming for 2.1 hl/hl globally and 1.9 hl/hl at sites in high-risk areas by 2032. It previously planned to hit 2.0 hl/hl globally by the end of the decade, and 1.7 hl/hl at breweries in high-risk areas. 

Heineken revealed that it’s already achieved part of its (less ambitious) 2030 target, hitting 2.9 hl/hl in 2025 for its breweries globally, down from 3.1hl/hl in 2024.  

The brewer also saw a reduction at water-stressed sites, down to 2.9 hl/hl compared with 3.0 hl/hl in 2024.  

Wins for fashion

Inditex and H&M both reported good progress, with the former revealing it’s surpassed its 2025 target to reduce relative water consumption in its supply chain by a quarter. 

It said it had actually cut it by 26%, to 75 litres per kilogram of garment, compared to a 2020 baseline. 

Meanwhile, H&M reported smashing its 2025 goal to reduce freshwater usage in its Tier 1 and 2 wet processing units (plants involved in activities like bleaching, dying and printing) by 10%. 

The Swedish firm said the current reduction was in fact 22.8% compared with 2022, and 11% compared with last year. 

“This positive development was mainly driven by a decrease in total material weight for commercial products, improved water efficiency measures, and increased recycling and reuse of water throughout the year,” it said.  

Misses elsewhere  

Swiss bottling giant Coca-Cola HBC revealed a mixed picture in its sustainability statement this month. 

Despite launching water stewardship projects at all its remaining high-priority locations last year, it failed to hit its 2025 target (to cut usage by a fifth at key plants). According to its website, it has improved by just 8%.   

“While we are yet to achieve this target, we have made substantial progress and are committed to advancing water efficiency across our operations,” the company wrote.

Henkel also appears to have missed its 2025 goal.  

The German chemicals firm reported this month that it was 13 percentage points short of its target to reduce water withdraws per metric tonne of product by 35%.  

It blamed changes to its product portfolio, including the shift from powder to liquid detergents in several core markets.  

Henkel said it will set new targets in 2026.