According to Riaan Heyl, CEO of PepsiCo South Africa, the main goal of the company in South Africa is Black Economic Empowerment. This comes after a promoted piece on the financial- and business-news outlet MoneyWeb by Heyl outlined their progressive aims in the country.

The acquisition of Pioneer Foods in March 2020 by PepsiCo Inc, arranged by Alan Winde and his allies in WESGRO, has seen the capture of a large proportion of local food brands by the American megacorporation.

And under the newly appointed CEO of PepsiCo South Africa since May this year, the company will be focusing not on straightforward business practices and core profits, but on accelerating ESG commitments to minimising white participation in the industrial value chain and maximising renewable energy usage, putting “sustainable development” at the heart of its corporate strategy.

But the competition commission, little worried about foreign market capture, focused instead on BEE. Two years after the merger, PepsiCo launched a R1.7 billion employee share scheme for its SA staff as part of the conditions imposed by the Competition Tribunal.

Other pressures on the company include policy commitments required by investment targets of most major global hedge funds, known as ESG scores, under which the company is obliged to minimise white participation in their supply chain, employment and management, and push for a certain model of environmentalism.

According to Heyl, PepsiCo’s “corporate citizenship” initiative focuses on food security, nutrition, access to water and agricultural development. Part of this effort has the profit motive of increasing efficiency in the local supply chain.

Heyl stated that there were several partnerships in operation with national government, industry bodies, non-governmental organisations, and communities to increase their control of local agriculture as well.

Primarily, they aim to steer local agriculture to the “regenerative agriculture” model, through the Kgodiso Development Fund, which was founded following approval of the acquisition of Pioneer Foods. This includes training and finance programs to push for transformation of the local agricultural sector, as well as drawing these new farms into their financial empire.

“Since launch, the fund has invested R144 million (of a total of R300 million earmarked for agricultural projects) across 43 black-owned entities. Of this amount, 20% is supporting women, and 10% has gone to supporting youth.”

“An additional R200 million of funding from the Kgodiso Fund is allocated to the education programmes that target scarce skills in the consumer goods and agronomy sectors. Our graduate programme is dedicated to developing leadership capability. The first cohort of candidates from these programmes graduated earlier this year, with 97% of them being absorbed into the business.”

The company also claims plans to “replenish” 100% of the water they use, though details on how this was to be achieved were not provided.

Additionally, the company will be pouring funds into various municipalities across the country, ostensibly to improve schools and sanitation services, though it could be argued that this budgetary supplement, even if only in kind, could produce a system of political dependency.

We also fully implement the Alliance for Water Stewardship (AWS) standard at all high-risk water facilities. This requires increased collaboration, advocacy, idea-sharing, and investment to address water insecurity. We will use AWS to elevate efforts to address water risk and mitigate water insecurity.

The environmental aims remain attached to the concept of “net zero”, claiming a deadline of 2030, and touts renewable energy installations at 13 production sites and three distribution centres is 10.7 megawatt peak (MWp), with others still underway.

This includes solar installations at the Atlantis Cereals and South African Dried Fruit plants in Upington, completed in July 2022, the Weet-Bix Plant from December 2022, and the Parow Central Distribution Centre and Isando Phase 2 installations in April and August 2023, respectively. The Ceres Beverages installation is expected to be completed in early 2024.

While much of this could be of benefit to the local economy, the racial discrimination agenda, the aggressive financial acquisitions of supply chains and dependency-seeking partnerships with local municipalities pose a threat to local economic independence which should be of concern to Cape citizens.

‍