The UK government, a signatory to the New York Declaration on Forests and the Amsterdam Declarations, is strongly committed to supporting a transition to sustainable supply chains for agricultural commodities which are currently associated with deforestation in developing countries.
An increasingly important item on AIC’s agenda is the sustainability of the entire food supply chain as it attracts greater attention from NGOs, retailers and governments, with deforestation in relation to soya being given particular focus.
The PEF, Product Environmental Footprint, was launched as an initiative by the European Commission under the Single Market for Green Products Communication in 2013.
The FEFAC Soy Sourcing Guidelines (SSG), which have been under review for the last 12 months, have been developed in line with one of the ambitions of FEFAC’s Feed Sustainability Charter 2030 for continuous improvement in responsible soy sourcing.
The FEFAC Feed Sustainability Charter 2030 Charter is the European feed industry response to the EU Green Deal Objectives affecting EU feed and livestock production. The Charter contains concrete feed sector actions at EU and national level featuring animal nutrition solutions that can help increase the sustainability of livestock farming operations.
Chaired by Caz Graham from BBC Farming Today, the agenda also boasts a collection of impressive speakers ranging from Defra’s Minister of State for Agriculture Victoria Prentis and Minette Batters, NFU President to Kate Hofman, Co-Founder of GrowUp Urban Farms and Fiona Smith, Law Professor at University of Leeds.
The AIC has submitted its response to the Government’s consultation entitled Due diligence on forest risk commodities. The consultation considers whether the Government should introduce legislation that would require a ‘small number of larger businesses’ to guarantee that commodities that can be responsible for deforestation have been produced legally, in accordance with relevant, local laws.
DEFRA and the devolved governments are working together to produce sector frameworks which will provide the basis for co-operation and co-ordination across policy areas.
