Demand consumer companies end deforestation!

Over ten years ago, the world’s biggest retail companies committed to ending deforestation in their supply chains by 2020. But here we are in 2021 and these companies failed to meet their deadline.

We need your help to hold these companies accountable.

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To: Members of the Consumer Goods Forum

CC: Didier Bergeret, Director of Forest Positive Coalition

Over ten years ago, the Consumer Goods Forum made a commitment to achieve zero-net deforestation in its members’ supply chains by 2020. 2020 has come and gone, and despite renewed rhetoric and roadmaps, CGF member companies are still sourcing from suppliers responsible for deforestation, land grabbing, and human rights abuses without repercussions or accountability.

While companies have failed to take adequate action, the global deforestation crisis has only gotten worse. Year after year we watch as the planet’s last standing forests are razed for plantations and pastures, releasing tonnes of carbon emissions, putting the planet in peril. But this is not only a crisis of environmental destruction. Industrial agricultural commodities are responsible for an epidemic of criminalization, violence, and murder. A 2020 study found that four land and environmental defenders were killed every week of the previous year, with agribusiness being the second deadliest sector.

The time to act is now. Last year, 200,000 people signed a petition demanding the CGF eliminate and remedy deforestation, peatland destruction, and human rights violations in their supply chains and support necessary legal and policy reforms.

While the CGF has acknowledged where it has fallen short, and adopted a new approach, without tangible and meaningful action these new plans will simply amount to too little too late. Therefore, we call on the CGF – starting with the Forest Positive Coalition – to ensure each of its members:

-	Enact a mandatory requirement for all suppliers to adopt group level NDPE policies;

-	Establish thorough due diligence, risk assessment and monitoring systems to ensure recognition and respect for local communities’ customary land rights and compliance with international standards of Free, Prior, Informed Consent (FPIC) throughout supply chains;

-	Publish non-compliance protocols including thresholds to determine the status of sourcing and suspension or termination of non-compliant suppliers, as well as formal grievance redress processes for human rights, land conflict, and labor violations;

-	Commit to zero-tolerance for violence and intimidation of land, environmental and human rights defenders that include clear human rights and grievance redress policies;

-	Support legislative and regulatory measures in demand-side markets to address deforestation linked to the international trade in agricultural commodities.

These recommendations have been provided multiple times over the past several years by civil society organizations, concerned citizens, and technical experts, but have never been adopted. The CGF’s decade-long failure has gained the attention of a wide breadth of individuals and institutions from Indigenous Peoples federations to everyday consumers to youth climate activists.

The whole world is watching. It’s time for the CGF to get it right.

Sincerely,
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