DEERFIELD, Ill., U.S. – A report published as part of Mondelēz International’s commitment to the Cocoa & Forests Initiative (CFI) demonstrates significant progress against ambitious 2022 targetsto protect and restore forests in cocoa-growing areas. Delivered through the company’s cocoa sustainability program, Cocoa Life, this progress is a crucial step towards achieving the company’s new Science Based-Target to reduce absolute end-to-end greenhouse gas emissions by 10% by 2025 (compared to 2018).
Published last year, these 2022 targets cover the company’s two largest cocoa-sourcing countries – Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire – as well as going beyond the CFI countries to cover its third largest, Indonesia. Cocoa Life’s approach to these commitments has been twofold: to enhance and scale up the most successful initiatives in cocoa farming communities; while also piloting and learning from new, innovative approaches that will be accelerated or course-corrected this year.
Successful scaled-up initiatives led by Mondelēz International include:
- Cocoa Life has mapped 100% of the farms registered with Cocoa Life in Ghana, Cote d’Ivoire and Indonesia when targets were set in 2018, and is mapping farms newly registered in 2019 – to ensure cocoa is not being sourced from protected forest areas.
- In 2018 and 2019, Cocoa Life trained more than 134,000 Cocoa Life registered farmers in Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire and Indonesia in Good Agricultural Practices to increase yields and protect the environment.
- In 2018 and 2019, more than 60,000 farmers in Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire and Indonesia participated in Village Savings and Loan Associations (VSLAs), which, through access to financial services, enable cocoa farmers to become more climate-resilient.
To protect the future of cocoa farming, Cocoa Life continues to pilot innovative projects, including:
- Pioneering financial incentives designed to encourage climate friendly farming – Payment for Environmental Services – have been a success in Côte d’Ivoire and will be scaled up in 2020. These financial incentives are offered to cocoa farmers in return for planting non-cocoa trees on farms, and for protecting and renewing forest areas.
- Targeted Good Agricultural Practices (GAPs) pilots in Ghana, where farm practices are tailored per farm to increase cocoa productivity, are ready to be scaled up.
- Cocoa Life’s agroforestry pilots successfully provided a better understanding of how to make farms more resilient to the impacts of climate change.
- In 2019, Cocoa Life launched the first-ever tree registration app for farmers in Ghana to register their trees via smartphone, empowering farmers through tree ownership so they benefit from revenue generated through yields.and compensation should the tree be destroyed by timber merchants.
- Cocoa Life tested a deforestation risk assessment project in Côte d’Ivoire reaching 125,924 ha of forests covered in the assessment by 2019. In the next couple of years, the program will roll out this approach in other countries and continue to advocate for a more standardised approach within industry to see enhanced progress.
Mondelēz International is committed to continuing work together with the World Cocoa Foundation, IDH The Sustainable Trade Initiative, governments and other industry players to combat deforestation, and remains committed to sharing its own lessons and expertise, to encourage transparency and collaboration within the sector.
