Social Contributions

Social Contribution Strategy

Our Approach

Since the establishment of the industry’s first dedicated social contribution department in 1999, CJ CheilJedang has consistently engaged in social contribution activities particularly in areas that require social attention and in where in can excel most. We conducts integrated social contribution activities that focus on creating core values related to ‘wellness and safety’, and ‘sustainable environment’. Through initiatives such as the Food Bank donations, which started in 1999, as well as various food sharing programs and volunteer activities by employees, the company contributes to the development of local communities

Social Contribution Strategy System

Major Activity

Health and Safety

HOPE Food Pack

The HOPE Food Pack, in collaboration with Food Bank, provides food packages to vulnerable groups and promotes healthy lifestyle habits. CJ CheilJedang delivers five food packages annually to 2,000 children selected from 81 local child welfare centers nationwide. Each year, the company donates products worth approximately KRW 300 million, including Hetbahn, Cupbahn, bibigo soup dishes, and Spam. These products are distributed on weekends and other days when school meals are unavailable, as many children at local child welfare centers skip meals due to their parents working full-time. In 2025, CJ CheilJedang and its partner companies, including Mijung and Malgeunmule Holdings, joined the HOPE Food Pack campaign, adding greater value to their social contribution efforts through shared growth.

In order to contribute to the health and well-being of our future generations, we support them with food packages and programs for healthy lifestyle. In order to promote healthy development of children and to eradicate hunger problems, we ran the ‘Hope Food Pack’ program and delivered 70 food packs over 10 occurrences to 2,000 local children from July to November 2021.

CJ CheilJedang Sharing Refrigerator

The CJ CheilJedang Sharing Refrigerator program provides food support to youth and promotes food security and nutrition improvement through targeted food policy initiatives. Since its launch in 2021, the program has continuously supplied refrigerated and frozen foods, including Hetbahn, to 11 Seoul Youth Centers. In 2024 alone, the program delivered food packages to 12,386 young individuals. Additionally, it supports at-risk youth through nutritional education, dietary self-assessment, and community activities such as cooking classes and social dining, helping to rebuild social connections.

Through this campaign, which was accompanied by the Seoul Youth Center Eunpyeong Orang, we developed opportunities to improve the eating habits of young people. In addition, they can practice the value consumption of food and develop this as an opportunity to raise awareness of the natural circulation and collection of waste.

Sustainable Environment

Hetbahn Container Collection and Upcycling

CJ CheilJedang operate a system for collecting and upcycling Hetbahn containers, raising consumer awareness of their recyclability. Local self-sufficiency centers equipped with cleaning infrastructure collect and wash Hetbahn containers that consumers have separated and disposed of after use. The cleaned containers are then delivered to processing companies, which use the processed Hetbahn material to produce final upcycled products.

In 2023, CJ CheilJedang collected approximately 560,000 Hetbahn containers, and in 2024, this number increased to around 990,000. Employees of CJ CheilJedang, CJ ENM, and CJ Freshway actively participated in this initiative, with the number of containers collected by employees. We have further encouraged participation in the collection efforts by general consumers by installing Hetbahn container collection boxes at 31 locations nationwide, including local government offices, the Seoul Youth Center, and Goodwill stores. Going forward, we aim to expand our resource circulation platform to raise awareness about the recyclability of Hetbahn containers and to increase consumer participation in their collection.

After purchasing a special set containing Hetbahn and a collection box from our company-owned mall, CJ The Market, you can return more than 20 used Hetbahn containers. The collected containers will be separated and cleaned from the local self-support center and recycled through the process of raw materialization, and in this process, jobs and revenue sources for the center will be created, developing this project into a CSV(shared value creation) business.

“Adopt-a-Beach” to take care of beaches like our pets

CJ Cheil Jedang has engaged with the local community and partnered with the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries to run the “Adopt-a-Beach” project, which involves consistently caring for a designated beach, similar to caring for a pet. In celebration of World Oceans Day, CJ CheilJedang has adopted Dadaepo Beach in Saha-gu, Busan, as its second “adopted beach,” following the adoption of Masian Beach in Yeongjongdo, Incheon. We have been taking care of Masian Beach for four years and plan to conduct more than three marine conservation activities annually at Dadaepo Beach. On World Oceans Day, employees participated in cleaning activities at the adoptedbeaches, and the collected waste is utilized as data to address marine environmental issues. As part of our ESG management, CJ CheilJedang actively participates in environmental conservation.

CJ CheilJedang participates in the public-participating beach management program called ‘Adopt a Beach’. In September 2021, 50 employees participated in the ‘Masian Beach’ adoption ceremony at the International Coast Cleanup Day event, and in June 2022, for World Environment Day, 50 employees participated in ‘Adopt a Beach’ activities. With the Mission Clear Data Logging app where you can directly check the amount of garbage collection and carbon reduction, we plan to continue promoting environmental and biological protection activities through marine garbage cleanup activities.

Community Engagement

Goodwill Store creating employment opportunities for people with developmental disabilities

Support for thedisabled to beself-reliantGoodwill Store

CJ CheilJedang donates food to the Miral Welfare Foundation's Goodwill Store, which provides salaries and jobs to employees with disabilities using proceeds from items donated by individuals and companies. In 2024 alone, we donated food products worth approximately KRW 5.4 billion, which enabled around 308 employees with disabilities at Goodwill Stores nationwide to receive monthly wages. In addition, Goodwill Store contributes 1 percent of the revenue from donated CJ CheilJedang products to the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), thereby supporting global efforts to address hunger. Since the launch of our food donation initiative to Goodwill Store in 2019, this program has also helped improve public awareness around “use-by” versus “best-before” dates, while enhancing recognition of CJ CheilJedang’s commitment to sharing. The total cumulative value of our donations through this program has reached approximately KRW 28 billion.

With profits from selling items donated by individuals and companies, CJ CheilJedang donated about KRW 1.8 billion in products since June 2019 to the Goodwill Store of the Miral Welfare Foundation, which provides jobs and salaries to employees with disabilities. As of December 2021, we have been providing ongoing jobs for 135 people with disabilities. In addition, as a leading company in the food industry, we are contributing to raising awareness of the value of foods with imminent shelf life, changing the public’s awareness of the shelf life of food, and reducing burdens. Since the second half of 2020, Goodwill Store has been sponsoring 1% of the sales from CJ CheilJedang’s donated product to the United Nations World Food Programme(WFP) to contribute to solving the international hunger problem(Zero Hunger).어

Food assistance for disaster relief

CJ CheilJedang provides emergency relief food composed of CJ CheilJedang products to help individuals facing difficulties due to disasters and emergencies have stable meals. The company has established an emergency support system in collaboration with the Disaster Relief Association to swiftly deliver aid to affected areas. In times of disasters such as concentrated heavy rainfall and wildfires, CJ CheilJedang offers emergency relief food to evacuees in need.

We support with emergency relief food consisting of our company’s products to ensure that people struggling from disasters can have stable access to food. In order to quickly deliver food items to the affected areas, the Disaster Relief Association has established an emergency support system, and provided KRW 25 million worth of emergency relief food to the people affected by the national torrential rain in 2020. In addition, KRW 23 million worth of disaster relief food was provided to the people affected by the Uljin and Samcheok wildfires in 2022.

Kimchi Giving Program, Participated by all sites

Volunteering by sharing Kimchi with all sites participating

At the end of each year, CJ CheilJedang engages in community outreach at its various site locations by giving kimchi, its flagship product of K-Food, to the elderly individuals living alone, underprivileged children, and individuals with disabilities, benefiting the local community. CJ CheilJedang 's employees actively participate in Corporate Social Responsibility(CSR) activities through CJ Donorscamp, which is the social contribution platform of CJ Welfare Foundation, supporting underprivileged children and youth to live healthy and fulfilling lives and spreading the spirit of giving.

CJ CheilJedang is working towards regional advancement and mutual growth by ‘Kimchi Sharing Program’, a flagship product that the company is manufacturing, with the local community at all of its business sites at the end of the year. We shared Kimchi with the elderly, vulnerable children and people with disabilities and in 2021, we delivered 411 boxes of Kimchi to 2,055 people from the vulnerable group. For the holidays, our Jincheon site delivered 105 boxes of our Tteokgalbi product to five of their local villages for mutual cooperation. Our Incheon site supported the people in the vulnerable groups within their region by sharing gifts.

Wonder Walk

“Wonder Walk” is a program that promotes the emotional and physical well-being of underprivileged children through walking activities and experiencing local cultural sites. CJ CheilJedang’s employees participated in the program as part of a community service initiative, walking alongside children from the Child Welfare Centers and exploring nearby mountains, parks, historical sites.

‘Walk and Experience Local Culture’ is a campaign supporting the emotional and physical health of children that are worn out from the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic by walking and experiencing local cultures with children from after-school study groups. For two weeks, 3,000 children from approximately 170 after-school study groups, nationwide and 300 CJ executives and employees, external experts, and influencers formed small groups, and walked/hiked nearby mountains, parks, historic sites, etc., abiding by the quarantine regulations. At the same time, a walking donation event through the CJ ONE app was held for the general public, and 3 billion steps by CJ ONE members were accrued. This was multiplied by 30, and the funds created were delivered to support participating after-school study groups as funds for activities, adding significance to sharing.

Dream Career Academy

To support practical independence for disadvantaged youth, “Dream Career Academy” provides vocational education, which upon successful completion of the education, provides opportunities for employment in CJ’s subsidiary companies. For young individuals who couldn't access professional vocational education due to challenging circumstances, “Dream Career Academy” offers training courses in fields such as cooking, baking, service management, and assists them in preparing for their future aspirations.

The Employment Training Program, since 2017, has been providing job training opportunities to youths from underprivileged groups. For the students that have successfully completed the training, we connect them to employment opportunities including CJ Group and others, to provide support for practical self-independence. This program offers training opportunities in cooking, bakery production, etc., for youths that haven’t had the opportunity to pursue their dreams and supports them in preparing for their dreams. In recognition of our efforts, we were awarded the CSV Porter Award for three consecutive years and were listed in the Hall of Fame. In 2022, we plan to expand the recipients of this program, including ‘adolescents terminated from protection of institutional care.’

Global Social Contribution

Ramadan Essential Goods Support Initiative

In observance of Ramadan, the Islamic holy month of fasting, CJ CheilJedang distributed 4,100 boxes of essential goods to marginalized communities in Indonesia. The Ramadan essential goods support activity is a long-standing social contribution initiative that CJ CheilJedang has maintained for several years. In line with the religious practices of Ramadan, which emphasizes selflessness and compassion for the hungry, CJ CheilJedang launched this initiative to support underserved communities.

Build Future Educational Environment

Established in 1997, CJ CheilJedang’s Jombang Plant in Indonesia has consistently engaged in ESG activities. Notably, in 2023, the plant hosted an environmental education program for 200 elementary school students. Through this initiative, CJ aims to instill the importance of environmental protection and the intrinsic value of nature in children. The company plans to continue offering various educational activities to further this goal.

the ‘Girls’ Education Campaign in Vietnam’

CJ CheilJedang has been actively involved in the CJ-UNESCO partnership for girls' education, which was formed in 2014 to improve the educational environment for girls in developing countries and raise awareness of its importance. Through this partnership, CJ CheilJedang and UNESCO have carried out initiatives in Nepal, Guatemala, Mozambique, and other countries to expand access to education and raise awareness about gender equality in education. Since 2019, we have been operating the “We Are ABLE”:Girls’ Education Project" in Vietnam in collaboration with students, teachers, local communities, and government agencies to expand educational opportunities for ethnic minority girls and increase women’s employment prospects. The second phase of the project, launched in 2023, will continue through 2025. The project provides parents, teachers, and community members a variety of educational programs, career exploration opportunities, and employment support, helping girls enroll in and complete secondary education. By equipping them with knowledge, skills, and confidence, the project empowers girls to shape their own futures and become agents of change in their communities.