Exclusive: Nestlé CEO Laurent Freixe sets the tone for Bühler’s Networking Days event

The CEO of Nestlé, Laurent Freixe has spoken of the company’s “Spider-Man moment” referencing its environmental and food production responsibilities, in a striking opening keynote address for Bühler’s Networking Days event, reports Neill Barston.

As the major food group leader noted to an invited audience of more than 1,000 food and drink industry professionals from around the world, the largest tests facing the sector centre on tackling the major challenge of climate change through regenerative best practice and collaborative initiatives.

Freixe was among a core array of food and drink sector leaders at the key event held at the headquarters of Buhler in Uzwil, Switzerland, urging industry to take combined action in light of key scientific analysis that has placed strain on 2050 net zero targets due to worsening climate conditions impacting global supply chains.

In his opening address, Freixe noted: “Climate change remains more than ever a reality and a huge threat, with 2024 being the warmest year on record, and food production accounting for a quarter of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, everyone in this room, either as a producer or consumer has a role to play in tackling the problem,” noting that the business remained committed to ensuring that its own operations remain resilient in face of key tests, as well as being sustainable in regards to its environmental performance targets, as it serves its growing global markets.

Laurent Freixe (right) alongside fellow speakers Thomas Zurbuchen, former head of science for NASA, and Johan Rockstrom, of the Potsdam Institute for climate impact research

Furthermore, he observed that one of the key issues facing the industry remained the challenge of attracting young people into the farming sector, with the average age over 55. He cited concerns around the fact that in Europe, only 6.5% of farmers are aged under 35, significantly down on figures from two decades ago, conceding that younger generations had seen the industry as being ‘unstable and limited in economic opportunity’ which needed to be addressed.

Notably, he highlight the packaged food goods sector as being a ‘critically important’ element of the overall area of focus for driving positive environmental impacts, stating that the business had placed a major emphasis on affordable good quality nutrition across its product ranges, with responsible production of these being of particular importance.

He concluded: “This is our Spider-Man moment. Like Spider-Man, we have collectively, great powers, strength, agility, foresight and the desire to do good, like all of you here today.

“Spiderman, says that “With great power comes great responsibility, and as key players in the food system, we collectively have power, we have the ability to address many issues that the planet is facing,” adding that through working with direct partners across the industry, sector organisations, start-ups, academia and governments in scaling-up progress to deliver real impact on sustainability pledges.

Bühler key progress 
For its part, Bühler offered a significant update on its own progress, with the business confirming that it had made gains against its own environmental pledges.

As Confectionery Production previously reported on from Networking Days in 2019, the Swiss business previously outlined significant targets for 50% waste reduction, energy and water use in its customers’ value chains, up from its previous figure of 30% cuts in a bid to accelerate its progress on sustainable production methods.

Significantly, the company stated that it had made strides in 11 out of 15 of its raw ingredient categories attaining at least 35% reductions, including in cocoa production, ancient grains, barley production for beer, as well as in animal proteins, which the business pledged to continue work on improving even further.

In his opening comments, Buhler CEO Stefan Scheiber (above), who is set to step down from his role after a decade in post, struck a realistic tone assessing the positives and challenges faced by the business in recent years, acknowledging that wider operating conditions remained challenging for many regions.

“We’re living in a world where there are many conflicts, there are wars and discussions on trade policy around the world, and on the population side, we have in both the souther and northern hemispheres, we have questions about how are we going to ensure access to education and training – and the question of whether AI is going to replace us all? 

There are so many uncertainties in the world now, but with our Networking Days, we are trying to build something that is helping us to overcome these aspects of uncertainty, and one of the answers lies in building trust within our network,” adding that its advanced headquarter facilities developed across its applications in grain processing, research and development and flavour research, as well as training have all helped the business maintain its strong connection to the wider industry.

He added: “The people in a business really change everything, and learned a lot during the covid situation, and one of the things we have done is create our Energy Centre, where we have concentrated everything around the topic of training and education for ourselves and customers,” with his colleague, chief technology officer Ian Roberts explaining that the additional facilities have proved instrumental in supporting fledgeling businesses that have helped forge its sustainability agenda across the business as a whole.

Though he cited considerable wider tests in the market such as the threat of cyber security posing a reported $10.3 trillion impact on global economies, he felt that through devising strong industry solutions and working in a collaborative spirit would prove vital to continued success.

On the topic of its 2025 sustainability targets, Roberts (pictured above), added: ” I think it’s very important that when we make commitments that we offer update, as that is central to transparency, and underpins the relationships between us all.

“In 2019, we stood on stage, we will have solutions available that will decrease waste generation, water use and energy use in value chains by 2025 – I am really pleased about that, we didn’t take that as a hollow promise, as we have built a fantastic team, and evaluated 15 value chains.

“We have not achieved everything, 11 out of 15 in those key KPI’s we hit 50%, but in all of them, we on the key KPI’s we attained 35%,” added the CTO, on the Networking Days event that gathered under the banner of “Multiplying Impact Together”. The senior executive confirmed that the company would continue its efforts through working closely with companies in order to further reduce waste in its value chains.

Diverse programme
The opening day’s session featured a dynamic range of speakers (which will be covered in an extended feature for the next edition of Confectionery Production magazine), with keynote presentations from Thomas Zurbuchen, of ETHz, who is the former head of science for NASA, who offered his thoughts on how technology is advancing to assist in monitoring climate change. He urged companies, governments and organisations to work collectively to address key tests.

Echoing that theme was Johan Rockstrom, director of Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, who warned that the established 2050 net zero timeliness for action were under severe pressure due to an accelerated scale of global warming – which is already having significant impact on agricultural supply chains around the world.

The afternoon of the first day also included a session dedicated to circularity for business success, which included contributions from Julia Binder, professor at IMD, Michele Andriani, president of Andriani benefit society, Andrea Illy, chairman of the Illy group, and Suyi Zang, of Chinese brewing business Luzhou Laojiao Company, who welcomed collective efforts towards delivering sustainability goals.

In the final presentations came from Johan Westman, president of AAK, who reflected on the company’s journey from improving its use of palm oil – which saw it go from 20% use of deforestation-free supplies, through to a present level of 90%, which has ushered in a new era of transformation for its practices. 

Ranjay Gulati, professor at Harvard business school rounded off the day in entertaining fashion as he delivered a key motivational presentation along the theme of recognising different types of courage. He cited several key examples including that of Tom Cruise in carrying out his own stunts for the Mission Impossible movies – with the actor acknowledging that it’s not that he doesn’t get scared, but that he does not in fact mind being scared in those high-pressure situations.