COKE-ISUZU PARTNERSHIP

Coca-Cola Beverage Philippines Inc. (CCBPI), the bottling arm of Coca-Cola in the country, has partnered with Isuzu Philippines Corp. (IPC)—the country’s leading manufacturer of brandnew trucks through Isuzu Gencars—to enhance safety and sustainability within Coke’s logistics operations. Sealing the partnership are (from left) Conrad Almazora, Almazora Motors Corp. executive vice president; Ruth Genota, CocaCola Beverages Philippines Inc. logistics director; D. Edgard A. Cabangon, Isuzu Gencars Inc. president and CEO; and Hajime Koso, Isuzu Philippines Corp. president.

COCA-COLA Beverages Philippines Inc. (CCBPI), the bottling arm of Coca-Cola in the country, has partnered with Isuzu Philippines Corp. (IPC)—the country’s leading manufacturer of brand-new trucks through Isuzu Gencars—to enhance safety and sustainability within its logistics operations. At least 95 top-of-theline vehicles have been turned over to Coca-Cola’s already expansive delivery fleet.

Coca-Cola operates one of the biggest truck fleets in the Philippines, with almost 3,000 trucks and over 2,000 sales service vehicles. Approximately 2,500 shipments per day are undertaken, transporting to 20,000 doors across the country. For operations this massive in scale, the company implements a road safety framework built on three pillars: organization and culture, vehicles and technologies, and the drivers. each pillar, in turn, has different programs and initiatives that address capability development, technical standards and monitoring, and driving performance and engagement.

“For every bottle of Coca-Cola that you purchase, there’s an implicit promise that it was delivered with the utmost quality, in accordance with strict safety guidelines, and adhered to high sustainability standards,” said CCBPI Logistics and Distribution Director Ruth Genota.

Isuzu FVR trucks with installed Allison Automatic Transmission— the first of its kind in the Philippines—were among the partnership turnover highlights. These trucks’ transmission were specially crafted by leading automotive expert Gendiesel Philippines Inc.

All the turned-over trucks deliver Isuzu’s 8-Point Advantage: 1) nationwide dealer network; 2) nationwide parts availability; 3) expert Japanese engineers; 4) expert service technicians; 5) mobile medic; 6) drivers and mechanics training; 7) safety driving training; 8) fuel eco-driving training. The installed palletized bottle carriers were made by IPC partner body builders, Almazora and Centro.

The partnership with Isuzu, whose commercial vehicles are known for their reliability and efficiency, is seen to deliver dependable transportation solutions to support Coca-Cola’s extensive and intensive distribution requirements. Isuzu trucks are equipped with euro IVto V-compliant engines that produce cleaner emissions; and with blue-power technology, which helps make the trucks more powerful, yet economical and environmentally friendly.

These new acquisitions are in keeping with Coca-Cola’s long-standing commitment to reduce carbon emissions and to achieve sustainable operations in fleet management— through low-emission engines in its trucks and through the adoption of new technologies to further improve our logistics and distribution capabilities.

Genota added, “At Coca-Cola, we make sure that our sustainability practice is a holistic process: our whole value chain, from manufacturing to distribution, has systems in place to reduce our environmental impact. This is a continuous process of improvement, as we work toward further strengthening our environment-conscious policies, across all facets of our operations.”

Coca-Cola in the Philippines said it has delivered strongly on its environmental stewardship across the business and the value chain through its other sustainability pillars: water, energy and waste. It reported attaining 100-percent water replenishment in the Philippines, via its water-saving programs and waste water treatment in its operations, in addition to providing far-flung communities access to potable water through the Agos Program. The company sources over 60 percent of its total energy requirements in the country from renewable energy; and in 2018, Coca-Cola announced its World Without Waste global goal of collecting and recycling every bottle and can sold, by 2030.