HEINEKEN Spain’s four breweries are all located in water-stressed areas. It’s an issue that’s becoming increasingly urgent in southern Spain where a large part of the region is threatened by climate change, desertification and unsustainable land use – impacting on biodiversity and water supply.

At HEINEKEN, we aim to balance the water we use in our breweries. HEINEKEN Spain first began to explore its opportunities to do so back in 2015. We found the best way to balance the water used in its breweries was to improve the land use in the surrounding watersheds.

To start the process, we launched a partnership with Commonland, a land restoration NGO that works with farmers and other land-owners. Together, we set out to co-design water balancing projects around the breweries.

The project at Jaén brewery involves innovative research exploring whether barley planted among olive groves can help improve water infiltration, prevent soil loss (erosion) and improve biodiversity and farmers profitability. We’re trialing the idea for four years on four farms, with the added bonus of providing local barley for our breweries. These four farms cover 5 hectares. At this stage, the objective is to research the benefits of this technique.

Project Results

If it succeeds, then large-scale adoption could save some 700 million of litres of water a year. That’s close to 100% of HEINEKEN Spain's water balancing target for the Guadalquivir watershed.