Sustainable Food Laboratory

Increasingly, people are turning to food company value chains to help with the challenges of wealth distribution and better management of basic resources (soil, air, water, biodiversity). The FAO and the Ford Foundation have recently taken assertive steps in this direction.

The FAO just completed a paper comparing, contrasting and exploring the two dominant practices in the realm of corporate social responsibility in the agrifood sector, 1) the roll-out of standards and codes and 2) value chain innovations (CSR in the Agrofood Sector). This paper starts by asserting the key roll that the agrifood sector can and must play.

Few industries have the potential to contribute to development progress on the same scale as the agri-food industry: its value chains involve millions of people from farm input providers to consumers, with many from developing countries. A relatively small number of companies have the ability to impact the lives of millions of people and their use of natural resources.

After thoroughly analyzing 14 of the most common standards (such as Global Gap, Rainforest Alliance, Marine Stewardship Council, Fairtrade), it states that a growing number of leading companies take a broader view of CSR:

Although a one-size-fits-all approach to sustainable development based on the wide application of a particular standard or code may indeed work for companies that have well-resourced suppliers, the more visionary agri-food companies are also starting to realize its limitations. They are adopting more innovative approaches to CSR – often in addition to standards and codes – that take a more holistic view of the agri-food value chain and are more tailored to comprehensively address specific key issues and situations. Most of these initiatives are designed in multi-stakeholder partnerships (including private and public sector players) to meet common objectives, and are rarely imposed by companies as the leading player. Such initiatives usually start as pilot projects, with the aim of scaling up those that are successful.

While acknowledging the benefits of the standards approach, the paper favors the value chain approach. But even the value chain approach is not without challenges, principally scale.

Although these value chain innovations clearly show impact, as long as they remain in pilot phase, they are only “pockets of social progress” that remain minor in comparison to the core business of agri-food industries, or with large-scale initiatives from NGOs and multilateral agencies. To expand their benefit for society, they require scaling up and integration into national agri-food competitiveness policy.

These findings validate our own. The Food Lab’s value chain work, for example the project with Green Mountain Coffee Roasters or the project with Costco are showing clear signs of positive impact in the source communities and our challenge lies with scale.

Here in the U.S. the Ford Foundation recently gave the Food Lab almost $100,000 to help investigate the impact that value chain projects can have in rural communities. This research will help Ford develop their new approach to rural development.

These steps seem part of a larger movement to seek out new roles for business in society - something more along the lines of companies tying their license to operate to responsible stewardship of the global commons.

By Hal Hamilton

Driving through fields of DelMonte pineapples in the Philippines, I felt an old familiar pain in my gut. Ever since being a farmer myself, I’ve never been able to see serious soil erosion without feeling a ill. I remember my own mistakes, plowing across a low place in a field where water crosses in a storm, and later watching the water take soil along with it, down hill away from the field and into waterways.

As Susie and I recently drove across thousands of hectares of pineapples, I saw my own mistakes repeated on a grand scale. Slopping land was plowed from horizon to horizon, with scarcely any patches of grass or trees left standing to halt the inevitable runoff from heavy rains. Deep red soils were flowing out of the fields, into the rivers and on to the sea.

The rolling landscape is a checkerboard of mud roadways for spray trucks to pass through the fields, each with long booms and spray nozzles suspended by pipes and chains over a stretch of pineapple hills between each roadway.

As we bumped along through the landscape, we could perch at the edge of steeply cut cliffs and watch brown sediment from the pineapple plantations stain the fast flowing rivers.

We asked local people if there are any environmental standards that affect the way pineapples are grown, whether, for example, there are any restrictions on the type of pesticides used. The answer was no, accompanied by stories of damaged crops on fields adjacent to the plantations.

Politics in the Philippines are often corrupted by those with the most money to spend. If we want to make sure there is soil left on those wonderfully productive fields, we probably can’t rely upon public authorities alone. We probably need to insist upon certification. The Philippine-owned DelMonte is unlikely to undertake improvements without demand from buyers, although their own self-interest, in the long run, ought to align with soil conservation measures.

Certification schemes add cost to the system, whether they are third-party systems like Rainforest Alliance or internal systems like Starbucks’ Café Practices. If a tonne of pineapples is costing more than a tonne of soil, however, surely the small cost of certification is worth incurring. From what I saw, we risk not having pineapples in the future. They don’t grow in rocks.
-Hal

Things are really heating up in the fishing world. The end of January brought a series of New York Times articles the depletion of fish stocks, stolen fish and high levels of mercury in fish. See how Brian Halweil of Worldwatch connects the dots on these three aspects of the fishing industry.

The European Union is stepping its response and the Sustainable Food Lab is involved.

As reported by the Associated Press, the European Union agreed on Monday to put a better mechanism in place by the end of 2010.

The Responsible Fishing Alliance (RFA) had its origins in the Sustainable Food Lab Fisheries initiative team and the RFA has been asked to comment on the European Commission’s proposal outlining a, “new strategy for the community to prevent, deter and eliminate Illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing”.

You can download and read the proposal in three languages here

My colleague Susan Sweitzer and I had the chance to speak about the Food Lab yesterday at a Presencing Institute led by Otto Scharmer, Arawana Hayashi, and Beth Jandernoa. Some seventy or so people from eighteen countries are in Cambridge all this week to learn about the U Process that is at the core of our work.

It’s always a pleasure to watch Otto teach, and yesterday was a wonderful reminder of the power of listening not from habit but from outside and within. Hard to describe in a sentence or two, so I’ll just suggest you read excerpts from Otto’s new book and place your order for it.

Once a year the National Restaurant Association (a different NRA) surveys over 1200 chefs of American Culinary Federation members to rate menu items as “hot,” “passé” or “perennial favorites.

Bite-size desserts, small plates, locally grown produce and organic products are the latest red-hot food items. Going out of style are low-carb dough, tofu, chai and foie gras according to these chefs.
Chefs rank the Top 10 “hot” items for 2007 as follows:
1. Bite-size desserts
2. Locally grown produce
3. Organic produce
4. Small plates/tapas/mezze
5. Specialty sandwiches
6. Craft/artisan/microbrew beer
7. Sustainable seafood
8. Grass-fed items
9. Energy drink cocktails
10. Salts (e.g. sea, smoked, colored, kosher)

Sustainable Food News summarizes the findings:

Trend: Small is (still) big. Bite-size desserts once again garner the top spot on chefs’ lists of what’s hot, and dishes categorized as small plates, tapas or mezze also ranked in the Top 5.

Why? Consumers want more control over their dining experiences, and that includes portion sizes. Small plates let diners build meals and snacks at their discretion—and share and sample as they please—while downscaled desserts allow them to indulge without overdoing.

Trend: Every ingredient has a story. Chefs cite locally grown and organic produce as the second- and third-hottest ingredients. Sustainably raised and grass-fed products also make the top 10, with free-range items not far behind.

Why? Diners increasingly are interested in how and where foods are grown, raised and produced, and they want to feel that they’re making responsible choices. The feel-good factor plays a key role here, as consumers are ever more eager to support practices that are kinder to the environment and more humane to animals.

Trend: Ethnic flavors are going places. Global influences abound on chefs’ hot lists, with top-rated cuisines including Latin American, Mediterranean, Thai, Pan Asian, Cuban, Spanish and Caribbean.

Why? Consumers are learning that ethnic cuisines often have the bold, assertive flavors they crave. Moreover, seeing an exotic ingredient or two woven into recognizable menu items adds cachet and makes diners feel adventurous.

Trend: Specialty alcohol’s shaking things up. Eight of the Top 25 hot menu items are on the beverage side: craft beer, energy-drink cocktails, martinis, mojitos, artisan liquors, organic wine and specialty beers.

Why? Credit the theory of trickle-down menu development. Instead of the big ideas heading from fine-dining to more-casual restaurants, they’re moving from the kitchen to the bar. Diners are demanding more choices and higher-grade options not just from what they eat but also what they drink.

My friends over at Corporate Watchdog Radio (soon to have a new name) have posted a really terrific interview with Peter Senge and Joe Laur of the Society for Organizational Learning. It includes a very good discussion of the Food Lab and some specific examples of what companies are doing to change the ways they do business.

This interview is a great resource, whether for explaining what we’re doing to your colleagues or to your Mom. Go check it out. While you’re there, you can subscribe to their podcasts.

We aren’t the only ones trying to figure out globally relevant and competitive farming enterprises that work for small-scale farmers, communities and the environment.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) along with three other partners just announced the Global Agro-Industries Forum (GAIF) next April. This form is to bring together 500 senior representatives from ministries of agriculture and industries, other UN agencies and civil society oganizations as well as agro-industry specialists and private sector food industry leaders.

“The Global Agro-Industries Forum will promote dialogue on strategies for developing competitive agro-industries that contribute to poverty reduction. It will thus build on success stories and winning strategies to develop competitive agro-industries in the developing world that include small-scale farmers and reinforce collaboration among all stakeholders from local to global levels, as well as public and private sectors.”

This forum is put on by The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) together with the Government of India, New Delhi, 8 to 11 April 2008.

How about making those corporate sustainability reports more readable?

You are invited to select the sustainability reports of interest to you and score them against five criteria. You must score at least two reports, and you must get your scores in by 31 December 2007.

Thousands of companies issue sustainability reports each year – but who reads them? Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and its partners – all leaders in the field - pioneered the first non jury-based worldwide online sustainability reporting awards scheme, the GRI Readers’ Choice Awards.

Winning reports will be a direct reflection of your preferences. Your participation will lead to a better understanding of readers’ needs and preferences, which could change the future face of sustainability reporting.

http://awards.globalreporting.org

Susan Sweitser has written up a report of the meetings in Guatemala, and you can download it here.

As always, Susie has put together a nice summary with some great quotations from meeting participants.

While most of the Food Lab headed to the meeting in Guatemala the New York Times published a story about a project one of our members has been intimately involved in: Local Carrots With a Side of Red Tape tells how very hard it can be to do something as simple as feeding New York City school children New York State carrots.