Did you know Coca-Cola created over 160,000 Jobs in Nigeria in just a year?

From Lagos market stalls to Borno boreholes, here’s the full story of what Coca-Cola in Nigeria’s impact actually looks like behind the numbers in a year.

If you have ever sold a Coca-Cola or any of its sister brands, refrigerated a crate of them or even just bought one cold bottle from a hawker in traffic, a kiosk or a supermarket, you might already be part of the story.

Coca-Cola first arrived in Nigeria in 1951. Since then, it has been refreshing the country and building a business, and, as new data from a year’s activities now shows, quietly becoming one of the biggest contributors to everyday Nigerian livelihoods.

A major Socio-Economic Impact study, commissioned by the Coca-Cola System and conducted by global consultancy Steward Redqueen in 2024, has put real numbers on what most of us have only ever felt anecdotally. 

Source: Steward Redqueen Socio-Economic Impact Assessment, Nigeria, 2024

Here’s the part that will surprise you. Only about 2,989 of those 160,200-plus jobs are direct employees of the Coca-Cola System in Nigeria (comprising Coca-Cola Nigeria Limited and the Nigerian Bottling Company). The remaining 157,200 jobs are supported across the wider value chain. That means retailers, distributors, truck drivers, farmers, and restaurant owners who deliver various stock and items. The neighbourhood shop that stocks Coke in a fridge or freezer. The man and woman who sell it from a cooler. The maintenance officer who fixes the chillers.

In fact, for every one job the Coca-Cola system directly creates in Nigeria, it supports 53 more across the economy. Think about that the next time you reach for a cold one.

What makes this story more than a corporate flex is where the impact actually lands. The Coca-Cola System sources most of its ingredients and packaging locally. Meaning that $601 million going to Nigerian suppliers is money circulating in Nigerian agriculture, manufacturing, and logistics. Not exported. Reinvested.

The packaging hub is not reinventing the wheel; it is simply scaling up the grassroots momentum already in motion. The System has supported several recycling initiatives across the country that have helped communities become cleaner and transformed the lives of individuals from an economic point of view. Those are real livelihoods built on recycling.

Also, for 25 communities which are dependent on the Otamiri River in Imo State as their water source, the System has helped ensure they have improved water access and security. To fix this, the System restored over 15,000 cubic meters of riparian buffers along the riverbanks to guard against pollution and enhance natural filtration, thereby impacting an estimated 2.5 million people. To sustain this, the project has incorporated modern asset management practices directly into the operational frameworks of local community committees and the Imo State Water Board.

So, when one ponders the impact of Coca-Cola in Nigeria, the real answer lies in 160,200 households impacted in a year, a robustly supported value chain, tonnes of waste recovered and recycled, and thousands of people with cleaner water.

160,200 livelihoods. $1 billion in economic activity in a year. They are not just numbers; that’s a national economic footprint.

So, when a single year can support more than 160,000 jobs and generate $1 billion in economic activity, it offers a glimpse of the lasting impact being created year after year across Nigeria by The Coca-Cola System, and, over time, the scale is easy to imagine.

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