Today saw the adoption of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework at the UN Biodiversity Conference (COP 15) in Montreal, Canada. The full list of documents can be found here.
Maria Lettini, Executive Director at the FAIRR Initiative, commented:
“The new ‘Paris agreement for nature’ agreed at COP15 earlier today is a potential landmark moment for the world’s ecosystems and will have impact across the entire meat, fish and dairy supply chain. Protein producers are the largest drivers of deforestation; the greatest contributors to freshwater, soil and oceans pollution; and the users of substantial volumes of the world’s freshwater.
“FAIRR’s latest research found that currently 60% of the world’s leading meat producers source feed (soy) from areas at high risk of deforestation AND haven’t set deforestation targets. In addition, 80% of FAIRR’s companies fail to have robust nutrient management plans, and over three quarters of companies are not sufficiently assessing the significance of operating in regions with high risk of water stress.
“The target for companies to disclose their nature-related risks and impacts, including along their supply chains, will be particularly important as food companies’ supply chains have expansive impacts and can be hard to track.
“Bottom line is that the industry is wholly unprepared and will need to urgently adapt if we are to meet the targets laid out in the new Global Biodiversity Framework. This is a laudable first step. We now need to move from dialogue to action to mitigate the potential financial and regulatory implications to companies’ bottom lines and investors’ long-term investment returns.”
