In its quest to end deforestation, one of the threats to the country’s cocoa sector, Cargill, a company committed to nourishing the world in a safe, responsible and sustainable way, has commenced a project to stop further conversion of any forest land in Ghana and neighboring Ivory Coast for cocoa production.
The firm has therefore outlined plans to eliminate deforestation from its cocoa supply chain in a plan, dubbed “Protect Our Planet”.
The Plan provides concrete actions the company is taking to achieve 100 percent cocoa bean traceability.
A statement from the Cargill, copied to the citinewsroom.com, said the plan expanded the company’s forest efforts to five origin countries (Brazil, Indonesia, Cameroon, Ivory Coast and Ghana), as well as the indirect cocoa supply chain, while securing the future livelihoods and resilience of smallholder cocoa farmers.
In the statement, President of Cargill Cocoa & Chocolate, Harold Poelma, noted the need to end deforestation in the countries the company sources cocoa from.
“We recognize there is considerable urgency to address climate and deforestation challenges. This means engaging in programs to stop deforestation in the countries from which we source cocoa.”
In October 2017, Cargill introduced five sustainability goals for a thriving and sustainable cocoa sector, aligned with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
“Protect Our Planet, which will be implemented in five origin countries where Cargill sources cocoa and throughout the company’s indirect supply chain, outlines how the company will achieve those goals and eliminate deforestation from its supply chain by 2030,”
In the statement, cocoa farmers were urged to avoid depletion of forest as they go about their business.
“We need to make sure that cocoa farmers can make a living, without harming the environment. We’re working with cocoa farmers to help them adopt greener practices: from learning to farm existing land more efficiently, to supporting reforestation and biodiversity-enhancing efforts through agroforesty and conservation”.
On supply chain transparency, the statement said Cargill intends to achieve 100 per cent cocoa bean traceability through the mapping of its entire cocoa supply chain, using GPS and polygon farm mapping globally, to identify the exact location of the farms and accurately assess farm size.
“Cargill is integrating environmental protection projects into its Cocoa Promise program. This includes expanding existing programmes related to growing more cocoa on less land, economics and labour issues to include agroforestry, and conservation,” it said.
On supplier engagement, it said the company is committed to managing the risk of deforestation not only in the Cargill Cocoa Promise supply chain, but also within indirect cocoa and chocolate ingredient supply chains, which include raising standards for third-party suppliers to advance their own transparency and build their capacity to address common challenges.
The statement said the journey towards sustainable business practices is far greater than the interests of any one company, adding that last year; Cargill consigned the Cocoa and Forests Initiative (CFI) alongside 34 other chocolate and cocoa companies, the World Cocoa Foundation, and the Sustainable Trade Initiative to achieve a fair and secure cocoa supply.
Cargill employs 155,000 employees across 70 countries, having been around for 153 years. It partners food, agriculture, financial and industrial customers in 125 countries.
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By: Philip Nii Lartey | citinewsroom.com | Ghana
