Ecological and climate breakdown share many of the same drivers: notably, the destruction of forests and other natural ecosystems by industrial agriculture. Some 80% of global deforestation is a result of agricultural production, which is also the leading cause of habitat destruction. Animal agriculture – livestock and animal feed – is a significant driver of deforestation, and is also responsible for approximately 60% of direct global greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture.

Halting deforestation and restoring the world’s forests is the cheapest and fastest way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and ensure rapid carbon uptake.

At the 2010 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Cancun, members of the Consumer Goods Forum (CGF) committed to eliminating deforestation by 2020 through the responsible sourcing of the commodities most linked to forest destruction: cattle, palm oil, pulp and paper, and soya.

 

Yet, despite these commitments, global commodity production remains a leading cause of forest destruction. Analysis by Greenpeace International suggests that, by the start of 2020, some 50 million hectares of forest – an area the size of Spain – are likely to have been destroyed for global commodity production since those promises were made in 2010.

 

Greenpeace says it wrote to more than 50 traders, retailers, producers and consumer companies early in 2019 asking them to demonstrate progress towards deforestation by disclosing their commodity suppliers. Only a handful replied and all of those that did disclose the requested information source products from traders or producers involved in forest destruction, they said. None of the 50 demonstrated “meaningful” action to end deforestation, the campaigners said, based on assessing their policies and publicly available supply chain information.