PepsiCo's Sustainable Sourcing Keynote at The US Summit

Procurement & Supply Chain LIVE: The US Summit brought together global leaders to explore how procurement teams can drive sustainability initiatives across supply chains.

The event featured discussions on decarbonisation, sustainable sourcing and net zero strategies, with procurement professionals taking centre stage.

The summit opened with a keynote from PepsiCo's Chief Procurement & Supply Chain Officer, Marcelo Stefani, and its North American Chief Sustainability Officer, Burgess Scott Davis, highlighting how procurement functions are becoming central to corporate sustainability efforts.

Procurement's role in sustainability transformation

The opening keynote, From Field to Shelf: How Procurement Powers Positive Impact Across the Value Chain, featured Burgess Scott Davis and Marcelo Stefani of PepsiCo.

The session explored how procurement teams could leverage specific mechanisms to achieve measurable outcomes against climate, packaging, water and agricultural targets.

Burgess highlighted the critical nature of transforming agricultural practices through procurement strategies.

“We know that if we do not transform the way that food is grown today, it’s really detrimental to certainly PepsiCo, but really to the entire food system and to society overall,” Burgess said.

“And we’re really leaning in on positive agriculture and regenerative agriculture in particular. Last year, we expanded the goals that we have and we currently have a goal to adopt regenerative, restorative or protective practices across 10 million acres by 2030. And we’re making really great progress.”

Burgess also discussed the link between sustainability in procurement within PepsiCo’s operations.

“The team is also working to embed the different requirements of regenerative practices within many of our agreements, particularly for those key crops of potatoes, corn, oats and sugar,” she said.

“We know that sometimes changing any company, any change that you make and certainly farmers are no different and each time they’re making a change to how they grow, there’s risk associated with that.

“And so the procurement team is working to help de-risk that transition and providing incentives and also putting into place long-term contracts to help manage the change for them.”

Building sustainability into procurement operations

Marcelo explored how PepsiCo reconstructed its procurement strategy with sustainability as a foundational element.

The company has shifted its approach to working with key partners, emphasising value creation in an evolving business landscape.

“You need to reinvent yourself every day,” Marcelo said. “You need to change the way you do stuff with AI coming as well. And therefore, the only thing that you can do is that you have an ecosystem for the suppliers that you are working with.

“I think now, from a sustainability point of view, in every agreement, in every building we do, we put the sustainability targets together with our need to deliver. And I think everybody now understands the cost of doing business with PepsiCo because PepsiCo, beyond any administrations, is trying to do good things for getting a better world for the future.

“And I think that was very relevant. We couldn’t do the same three years ago. We had to change the way we were operating.”

What is the pep+ strategy?

The points raised by Burgess and Marcelo align with PepsiCo's pep+ strategy, which places sustainable practices at the core of growth and value creation.

The strategy focuses on food access, safe water access, farming and workforce development.

According to PepsiCo, pep+ represents a strategic, end-to-end transformation that integrates sustainability into production, marketing and distribution whilst building operational and supply chain resilience.