value chains Archives - Global Landscapes Forum

Boosting biodiversity outcomes in green commodity value chains

kneditor — Tue, 29 Oct 2024 11:32:19 +0000

7th GLF Investment Case Symposium

How can we raise $200 billion a year for biodiversity and climate? From 21 October to 1 November 2024, global leaders gathered in Cali, Colombia, for the 2024 UN Biodiversity Conference (COP16), tackling critical issues like ecosystem protection, climate action, and food security. The 7th GLF Investment Case Symposium, the largest sustainable finance event in the Global South, explored how to fund these efforts, including the role of emerging tech like Artificial Intelligence (AI) in finding innovative solutions.

About this session

As global demand for sustainable agricultural and forestry practices intensifies, there is a growing need to integrate biodiversity into green commodity value chains. This session delves into country experiences and touch on advancements that enable more accurate measurement of biodiversity impacts and support the restoration of critical ecosystems.

Featuring voices from countries and experts working at the landscape level, this session explores innovative financial mechanisms that incentivize and sustain these efforts, including the growing potential of biodiversity credits. Gain insights about how these developments are shaping the future of green commodities and learn more about tools and strategies that can be applied to enhance biodiversity outcomes within value chains. Experts from across the sector will share research and practical case studies from country projects and discuss how to overcome challenges in implementing these methodologies for restoration on a global scale.

Resources

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Country voices: Creating a common vision for future landscapes

kneditor — Mon, 30 Sep 2024 14:36:46 +0000

About GLF Africa 2024

Can Africa show the world a sustainable way forward? The climate crisis is taking a toll on Africa – and especially on rural communities that depend on natural resources for their livelihoods.

On 17 September, thousands of participants gathered at ‘GLF Africa 2024: Greening the African Horizon’ in Nairobi, Kenya, and online for a global conference focused on forging a prosperous and sustainable future for Africa’s land- and seascapes, driven by local solutions.

Introducing PILA: A New Framework for Sustainable Agricultural Transformation and Landscape Management

A new framework to support countries in transforming agricultural systems by scaling up sustainable production, restoring ecosystems and alleviating pressure on forests to improve food value chains will soon be put to the test.

The Participatory Informed Landscape Approach, known as PILA, uses an integrated landscape management approach to accelerate the transformation of value chains at the landscape level. PILA, developed by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations as part of the Food Systems, Land Use and Restoration (FOLUR) Impact Program, is now being piloted in India, Kenya, Nicaragua, Nigeria and Vietnam.

Hosted by FOLUR, this session brings together experts and landscape actors implementing PILA to discuss the role of integrated landscape management, how decisions across the value chain are made and the role of smallholder farmers.

Resources

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Enhancing Effectiveness of Food Systems, Land Use and Restoration Projects through Gender-Responsive Actions

kneditor — Thu, 26 Sep 2024 09:35:12 +0000

About FOLUR Practical Notes

This FOLUR Practical Note summarizes outcomes from a series of virtual events on gender equality hosted by the FOLUR Gender Learning Programme, organized in 2023 and 2024 for the Food and Agricultural Commodity Systems Community in the context of the FOLUR Impact Program. The presented issues resulted from discussions between 178 participants from 58 countries—including 17 countries that were hosting FOLUR projects—and 20 speakers and facilitators in these sessions, which shared global experiences and case studies from Asia, Africa, and Latin America.

Explore more resources on the GLF-FOLUR Partnership platform.

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2024 the “Year of Climate Dialogue in Ukraine”

kneditor — Thu, 11 Jul 2024 15:15:18 +0000

About GLF Peatlands 2024

Peatlands cover 3-4% of Earth’s land but store a third of global soil carbon. Despite their importance, 12% are degraded, contributing 4% of human-induced emissions.

Degradation, driven by agriculture and forestry, causes environmental and social issues like fires and economic damage. Managing peatlands effectively requires collaboration across sectors.

The Global Landscapes Forum (GLF) Peatlands 2024 Hybrid Conference brought together global stakeholders to address gaps in peatland science, policy, and practice. Held alongside the UNFCCC Bonn Climate Change Conference, it explored peatlands’ roles in carbon storage, biodiversity, and water regulation.

Protecting peatlands in Ukraine

Ukraine has roughly 1 million hectares of total peatland area, yet the regions of Volyn and Chernihiv are deemed inaccessible due to military actions from the 2022 occupation. Yet, even before the invasion, Ukrainian communities suffered from the annual burning of peatlands and the disappearance of groundwater in the landscapes, the result of the drainage of wetlands during Soviet times. Roman Shakhmatenko, team lead, UNDP Ukraine Energy and Environment Portfolio, speaks on the role of peatlands in the country and national measures to protect these areas.

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FOLUR Spring Update 2024: Lessons from the Landscape

kneditor — Fri, 14 Jun 2024 14:41:31 +0000

Restoring Landscapes to Sustainably Feed the Planet

Food production drives climate change, deforestation, pollution, and biodiversity loss, contributing a third of global emissions. Unsustainable practices threaten key commodities like coffee, cocoa, and soy, worsening environmental degradation and rural poverty.

The FOLUR Impact Program, funded by the Global Environment Facility and led by the World Bank, reforms food systems and restores landscapes. Active in 27 countries since 2021, FOLUR promotes participatory approaches, involving local communities and Indigenous Peoples in resource management. The program uses tools like the Participatory Informed Landscape Approach (PILA) to connect projects with global knowledge and align with international regulations.

FOLUR aims for sustainable value chains by 2050, balancing high yields with conservation, and addressing the significant costs of food system inefficiencies estimated at $12.7 trillion by the FAO.

Download the spring update to learn more about FOLUR’s latest achievements.

Explore more resources on the GLF-FOLUR Partnership platform.

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Company action in collective efforts for sustainable land use at scale

kneditor — Mon, 25 Mar 2024 14:57:25 +0000

About this report

This report summarizes findings and recommendations from a 15-month study initiated to advance understanding of the use of landscape and jurisdictional approaches as a key corporate strategy for downstream and midstream companies to achieve sustainable sourcing and have positive impacts in the regions they are sourcing from.

The study identified 113 companies supporting landscape and jurisdictional initiatives across 91 initiatives, in 19 countries. Recommendations have been drawn from the research for downstream and midstream companies to mobilize more private sector action.

Key recommendations for companies

Increase landscape-scale action and integrate it into corporate sustainability and business strategy
Invite and/or incentivize other private sector actors to take landscape-scale action
Spotlight multi-stakeholder collaboration to transition towards sustainable land use at scale
Align resources and efforts in committed and/or progressing landscape and jurisdictions.

The report contains three further recommendations for the wider community working with landscape and jurisdictional approaches. Using the results from the research, a business case is presented in the report for companies to see the opportunities and assist the transformation to sustainable commodity production through multi-stakeholder collaboration at scale.

This report is part of a global study that aims to understand how midstream and downstream companies have been using landscape and jurisdictional approaches to address commodity-driven deforestation. The study includes five commodity specific reports on cocoa, palm oil, pulp, paper and packaging, beef and soy landscape-scale action as well as this final summary report. The study also delves deeper into other possible uses of these approaches, in a report on meeting corporate climate, nature and people goals.

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Working with smallholders: a handbook for firms building sustainable supply chains (Third edition)

kneditor — Mon, 25 Mar 2024 14:44:05 +0000

A number of global trends, such as concurrent rises in incomes and urbanization, are driving the increased consumption of meat, dairy, and biofuels. Meeting the demand for products will require considerable increases in global production, particularly in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, where smallholder farming predominates and yields remain low. At the same time, it will be essential to promote improved food quality, to reduce negative impacts on health, while additional initiatives must address how to reduce food losses. Climate change is bringing further stressors. These challenges also present opportunities to help smallholder farmers boost their productivity by facilitating better access to inputs, technology, knowledge, financing, and markets. Agribusinesses are increasingly working with smallholder farmers in low- and middle-income countries to secure agricultural commodities, which help to boost rural incomes and economic growth. Smallholders also represent a growing market for farm inputs, information, and financial services.

Working with Smallholders: A Handbook for Firms Building Sustainable Supply Chains’ shows agribusinesses how to develop more sustainable, resilient, and productive supply chains and the substantial impact of doing so on development. The book compiles innovative solutions and cutting-edge ideas to meet the challenges, and illustrating these points through a variety of case studies from initiatives around the world.

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Traceability and transparency in supply chains for agricultural and forest commodities

kneditor — Mon, 25 Mar 2024 14:27:24 +0000

A review of success factors and enabling conditions to improve resource use and reduce forest loss

Close to 90 percent of forest loss is associated with expansion of agriculture, resulting in an urgent need for better solutions to identify and help manage the risk of forest loss associated with commodity supply chains. Traceability and transparency are increasingly called on to help halt and reverse forest loss.

The Traceability and Transparency in Supply Chains for Agricultural and Forest Commodities Report shows that despite the rapid progress seen to date in developing traceability and transparency solutions, key challenges and data gaps remain. It also examines what is needed to ensure that initiatives, tools and policies are set up for success.

The report aims to inform collaborative action among governments, the private sector, and civil society organizations that are working toward enhancing traceability and transparency. It focuses on seven commodities: cattle, palm oil, soy, cocoa, timber, coffee, and rubber, but also offers insights applicable to other commodities.

Key Findings

Independent verification is necessary for traceability systems to be credible. Definitions need to be applied consistently.
Governments should provide an adequately resourced policy environment that facilitates traceability and transparency within the challenges of complex supply chains. Investments are rarely one-off since continued funding is usually needed. Approaches to traceability and transparency must consider the needs of smallholders to be effective.
Data gaps remain, especially where there is a large smallholder component, but equally important is ensuring that data are accessible and usable. Investments are needed to help close these gaps.
Despite gaps, there is enough existing data and information for supply chain actors to take meaningful steps toward assessing the risk of forest loss in supply chains, and to prioritize areas for action.

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Advancing gender equality and agrifood systems: what’s working?

kneditor — Thu, 14 Mar 2024 15:08:23 +0000

The briefing identifies three main categories of constraints impacting gender equality within agrifood systems: structural barriers, land tenure, and resource access. Through case studies from Guatemala, Indonesia, and Kenya, it explores initiatives aimed at addressing these issues. The insights gleaned from these studies offer valuable lessons to understand what has worked to drive changes in behavior and practice.

Key messages

Gender disparity in agriculture: Women constitute a significant portion of the agrifood workforce globally, yet they face undervaluation and earn less compared to men. Structural barriers like discriminatory norms limit their participation.
Barriers to participation: discriminatory social norms and legal frameworks hinder women’s access to resources and opportunities in agrifood systems, affecting their welfare and household outcomes.
Empowerment yields multiple benefits: Closing gender gaps in agrifood systems can alleviate hunger, boost incomes, and enhance community resilience. Understanding effective strategies is crucial for advancing gender equality and reaping these benefits.

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FOLUR Annual Report 2023: Cultivating a Community for Sustainable Landscapes

kneditor — Thu, 07 Mar 2024 16:42:13 +0000

This annual progress report covers the period from July 1, 2022 to June 30, 2023, providing an update on the Food Systems, Land Use and Restoration (FOLUR) Impact Program’s progress and achievements.

The emphasis during this period included strengthening community to accelerate fruitful knowledge exchange across country projects and disseminate insights into how best to initiate private and public sector action on value chains.

FOLUR is a powerful game-changer in the global arena, encouraging transformative government policies and private sector practices to support environmental restoration. This effort is urgent as supply chain vulnerabilities to risks from climate change on agriculture grow in tandem with a growing demand for food under pressure of population growth.

Download now for in-depth insights on key achievements, landscape restoration, program capacity strengthening, policy engagement, and more.

Discover the GLF-FOLUR Partnership for inclusive communication, knowledge-sharing, and to join the community of change-makers.

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