About us
Cereal Partners UK recognises its responsibilities to protect the environment and move towards sustainable development. We are committed to minimising our environmental impact and to conserve valuable resources. We support sustainable development and comply with our environmental policy to implement on-going business practices that will reduce our environmental impact.
We are committed to the Nestlé Environmental Policies. We monitor our actions and look to understand the requirements of current environmental best practices. We have a coherent and realistic set of plans to deliver against set targets for improving efficiencies in areas such as energy and water use, pollution, waste materials and recycling.
During 2009, we are working towards accreditation to the ISO14001 and OHSA18001, standards to demonstrate and achieve external verification of our Environmental/Safety performance and protocols.
Environment
Background
Our principal activity is the transformation of raw materials into a range of high quality breakfast cereals. We are therefore concerned with preserving the natural environment from which our materials are derived. However, our activities have associated environmental impacts.
Emissions
Cereal Partners monitors local emissions and outputs, and continually undertakes measures to prevent pollutions of any kind. We fully comply with all regulatory limits for local and national contaminations and emissions
Energy
Cereal Partners are committed to minimising the use of energy resources and cutting back our demand for energy (gas & electricity) by introducing energy efficient technologies and programmes. We monitor and measure our energy consumption in our steps towards improving overall energy efficiency.
Packaging
Adequate packaging is essential to transport the breakfast cereals to consumers’ homes whilst ensuring the product meets food safety standards and retains the quality that consumers expect. We use the minimum amount of packaging possible balanced with the product requirements.
The plastic liner is required to both protect the product safety and preserve the freshness, whilst cardboard packaging is designed to ensure the product can be efficiently transported and stored between point of baking and time of consumption.
The company continually holds reviews and assessments with its suppliers and support specialists to find solutions that result in lowering the weight and volume of packaging and increasing the recyclability, to make improvements to our overall packaging performance. .
Recycling
All of our packaging materials are suitable for recycling. That includes the plastic liner, the cardboard carton and the outer cardboard case used in shipping the cereals. On our packaging we clearly communicate and encourage consumers to play an active role in recycling their breakfast cereal packaging. This plays an important role in a sustainable environment, as the materials can be used again in future packaging materials.
Our outer shipping cases use recycled cardboard. Our cereal cartons use cardboard from woods which have independent forestry management certification. The PEFC ( Programme for Environmental Forestry Certification ) scheme is global and its aim is to assure that the world's forests are managed sustainably and that their functions are protected for present and future generations. The cardboard we use is supplied under the licence number PEFC/04-04-0008.
Transport
To minimise the ‘food miles’ we utilise sophisticated computer software to maximise the efficiency of our warehouse storage and transport systems. Maximising the pallet utilisation by ‘reverse engineering’ is an important step. This requires the cases and cartons the cereals are packed in to be designed around the size and shape of the pallet used for distribution. This ensures the distribution lorries are utilised to maximum capacity reducing the number of journeys required.
Waste
Where waste can not be eliminated, segregation (sorting of waste before recycling) and recovery of waste material at source is adhered to, in order to minimise waste sent to landfill and, enable efficient recycling.
Cereal Partners has a number of initiatives to ensure maximum efficiency from all materials, and procedures are in place to reduce waste as a result. These range from recycling any waste packaging materials, such as the cardboard and plastic liners, to food by-product which is sold on for animal feed.
Water
The manufacturing of breakfast cereals requires minimal amounts of water. Water is required to cook the wheat that becomes the main component of many Nestlé breakfast cereals and to wash certain equipment. We continue to focus on the reduction of water use across our business.
Each of our sites has its own environmental plan which balances its energy requirements for manufacturing breakfast cereals and the need to be environmentally sustainable. This will enable us to measure the impact of each site and to identify steps to further reduce our environmental impacts.