Coca-Cola to contribute $1.7 bn in India's agri ecosystem in 5 years

Beverages multinational Coca-Cola's Indian arm on Monday said it will contribute over $1.7 billion in the agri ecosystem of the country over the next five years.

According to the company, close to $800 million of this contribution would be towards the procurement of processed fruit pulp and fruit concentrate for its increasing portfolio of juice and juice drinks and carbonated drinks with juice products in India, and the remaining would be invested towards creating the required infrastructure.

The company also launched its Minute Maid Pulpy Mosambi beverage, produced with fruits locally sourced from Jalna in Maharashtra.

"An estimated 2,00,000 farmers will benefit from this five-year roadmap of sourcing fruit pulp and fruit concentrate derived out of 2.10 million tonnes of fruit," the company said in a statement.

The company said that through this initiative, its bottling partner Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages, 13 other independent franchise bottlers and fruit processing companies will invest around $900 million on manufacturing lines, juice bottling infrastructure and fruit processing plants and equipment and agriculture interventions over the next five years. This will help support the demand and the growing range of its non-carbonated drinks portfolio.

"More than 1,800 million tonnes of the Mosambi fruit has already been sourced from Jalna in Maharashtra for the first phase of the Minute Maid Pulpy Mosambi production. The investments announced today by Coca-Cola will further catalyse economic growth and create new opportunities for farmers and local suppliers," said T. Krishnakumar, President, Coca-Cola India and Southwest Asia.

--IANS

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