MILAN – Ferrero is proud to announce that it has made significant progress on its action plan to protect and restore forests in Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana as part of the Cocoa & Forest Initiative (CFI), a partnership between the two governments and companies to end deforestation in the cocoa sector.
The first progress reports show very promising results on the action plan they released last year, listing all the activities they aim to implement by 2022 to protect and restore forests in the cocoa sector.
“We can say with confidence that we are on track and even ahead of schedule to reach our CFI targets for 2022,” says the company in a press release. “For over 30% of our CFI indicators we are already close to reaching or have even exceeded our defined goals for 2022. This strong progress was possible due to the trusted partnership we have built with our suppliers over many years. We will even increase the targets where needed to continue delivering on ambitious goals.
We are proud of our performance in the first year. It energizes us to continue with the same dedication to make sure that we meaningfully contribute to this collective initiative and to the common goal of ending deforestation in the cocoa sector.”
In the first year, Ferrero showed strong progress especially on the following indicators:
- They mapped more than 140,000 cocoa farms in total in both countries.
- In one year, they developed more than 15,000 hectares of cocoa agroforestry in total in both countries.
- They distributed about 500,000 multi-purpose trees to farmers to plant on their farms.
They trained over 90,000 farmers and organizations in Good Agricultural Practices and over 32,000 farmers in Climate Smart Cocoa.
Ferrero also significantly progressed in their approach to source certified, mapped and traceable cocoa.
- By the end of 2020, all the cocoa in the supply chain will come from sustainable sources.
- By the end of 2020, they aim to have all farmers supplying us with cocoa beans polygon mapped.
- By the end of 2020, they aim to have all cocoa beans from both Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire segregated.
These milestones enable Ferrero to not buy any cocoa beans from protected areas and to support farmers in a targeted way to adopt agricultural practices that are good for their livelihood and for the environment.
“With the Cocoa & Forest Initiative we are bringing meaningful and lasting change into the cocoa sector. As Ferrero, we are very proud to contribute to this collective initiative and it is in line with our commitments and values as a family company. Moving forward, Ferrero will continue working to strengthen its cocoa sustainability program with a positive and lasting impact on the cocoa value chain,” says Marco Gonçalves, Chief Procurement & Hazelnut Company Officer at Ferrero.
As part of CFI commitment, Ferrero will report yearly on their progress
The Ferrero CFI action plan is embedded in Ferrero’s overall cocoa sustainability strategy, which the company is currently updating to define a strong path forward. We invite you to read more about the Ferrero Farming Values Cocoa Program in Ferrero’s annual Corporate Social Responsibility report (pages 128 – 143).
