Beef and soy industries in the Southern Amazon region of Brazil are at risk of almost USD 200 billion of productivity losses due to Amazon deforestation, according to a new scientific study. The study, published in Nature Communications in May 2021, looked at the relationship between deforestation and rainfall. It also assessed the impact of …
There has been a string of recent shareholder votes in favor of companies taking action to adopt or strengthen deforestation commitments. This trend is likely to increase as deforestation becomes a greater part of the climate change narrative and investors increase their understanding of how links to forest lost can lead to a variety of …
The Cerrado biome, a vast, biodiverse tropical savannah in Brazil, is under threat from commodity-driven deforestation. Soy expansion and cattle ranching are direct drivers of forest loss in the Cerrado. This report presents new data on specific actors linked to Cerrado deforestation in 2020, including the quantified risk exposure of the largest soy traders, meatpackers, …
Brazilian commodity trader Grupo Amaggi recently launched a green bond to expand its presence in the country’s soy market. The company’s USD 750 million green bond will allocate two-thirds of the proceeds to new schemes such as clean energy initiatives and the rest to refinancing debt for projects that include buying and processing certified soy. …
So far in 2021, there appears to be capital market movement from various players in the “big four” forest-risk commodity sectors. Major Palm Oil Company Moves Forward With IPO On January 4, 2021, PT Fangiono Agro Plantation (FAP Agri) issued the first initial public offering (IPO) of the year on the Indonesian Stock Exchange. The …
International corporations and investors have called on major soy traders to agree to a cut-off date for sourcing soy in the Cerrado biome. Signatories to the Cerrado Manifesto, which include 160 companies and investors that have exposure to the soy market, asked the traders in a letter late last year to stop sourcing from converted …
In 2017, the Task Force for Climate-Related Financial Disclosure (TCFD) released its recommendations for climate-related disclosures in financial filings. The TCFD has since become the de facto global standard for the financial sector to report on climate change risks. This paper presents a framework for assessing deforestation-related risks in agricultural commodity supply chains that is …
In a major step forward, eight French grocery store chains late last year signed an agreement to eliminate soy grown on deforested land from their supply chains through strengthening sourcing policies. Based on this agreement, the supermarkets will include no-deforestation clauses in supplier contracts to curb deforestation in the Brazilian Cerrado biome. European retailers have …
A technical report by Brazil’s land reform agency INCRA has deemed TIAA’s land titles in Brazil to be legally null and void. This conclusion is discussed in a new report by Rede Social, the Lawyer’s Association for Rural Workers (AATR), and GRAIN. TIAA (The Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association of America) is the largest international …
The beef and soy sectors have been two of the major drivers of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon and Cerrado biomes in recent years. Financial institutions with exposure to these sectors may be inadvertently contributing to climate change and biodiversity loss. As global stakeholders react to these threats, financial institutions may become increasingly more exposed …
