3 ms·

The EU is doing a lot of work in this space in other fields, basically looking at products that are high risk for environmental or social issues and requiring d

by furyg3 3y ago

The EU is doing a lot of work in this space in other fields, basically looking at products that are high risk for environmental or social issues and requiring due diligence and documentation for those products. I develop traceability solutions for agri-food, and it's pretty impressive to see how everyone is suddenly actually really researching their supply chains in the run up to new EU deforestation laws requiring this due diligence. Of course it's possible to debate the effects and impact of the legislation (in some cases companies may choose to bail completely on certain origins, which does little to advance environmental or social issues there), but from what I've seen so far it is acting as a catalyzing force at large organizations to start doing real due diligence efforts.

FirmwareBurner 3y ago
>everyone is suddenly actually really researching their supply chains in the run up to new EU deforestation laws requiring this due diligence How effective will that be on preventing illegal deforestation? A lot of illegal deforestation in the EU(Romania) is going on under the noses of the authorities which are complicit and help the local logging mafia get clean papers for their wood, and turn a blind eye to checks and help fudge reports as it's multi hundred million Euro industry thanks to huge demand from wood manufacturers in Germany and Austria who don't care how and where that timber comes form as long as it's dirt cheap and has clean looking papers. The logging mafia has no remorse to hurt or kill people getting in between them and their 7-9 figure revenues, let alone give a toss about cooking the books or fudging some traceability reports. Your agri-food traceability software seem more as solutions the big wood consuming mega corporations like IKEA can use to say "look, the traceability software says we're complaint, m'kay", to get out of a pickle when being caught red handed with tainted raw materials. The exact same thing is happening with the "ethically sourced" cocoa and coffee beans, which is often farmed by the same slave labor. Unless there's heavy policing by non-corruptible third parties, across the entire supply chains, and enough guilty people go to jail to send a strong message, traceability solutions and ethically sourced stickers don't mean jack shit as the paperwork can easily be fudged by system savvy people looking to make money.
- furyg3 3y ago
  As always, it's complex. The EUDR is focused on items originating outside the single market. It does not outline specific measures or tooling, outside of mandating things like containers must be accompanied by documentation showing the specific locations of origin (polygons of fields, or GPS points if the fields are small), as well as quantities from those locations and accompanying due diligence reports, that are to (eventually) be submitted to a central repository. If they don't, the products cannot be sold on the market, and companies may be susceptible to fines. Deforestation is something that is possible to monitor in various ways, including via satellite imagery. But some form of independent risk analysis and ground-truthing will almost certainly be part of any due-diligence process. I'm already seeing companies shy away from some 'legal' fields that are suspiciously close to protected areas that are undergoing / have undergone recent deforestation (which is also a risk, by the way, that farmers are punished for things outside their control). But what I'm saying is that right now companies either a) make their own rules, and own the communication space when they don't achieve them or b) subscribe to voluntary programs (rainforest alliance, fair trade, etc) which also have limited resources and where some conflict of interest can exist. Soon, companies will be legally responsible and this is a large culture shift, basically moving the problem from the CSR/ESG department to the sourcing department, which is where the deals are truly made. I expect that initial enforcement will be lax as everyone gains experience and adjust to the new situation, and there will (of course) be fraud. This will probably be mostly done in origin (when Nestle says jump a chocolate exporter says 'how high?'). But soon regulatory authorities will have databases of (traceable) products to field level and can correlate... only so much of product X can come from field Y, etc. And, by virtue of companies having to implement traceability to field level, much more can be said about other issues (child labor, wages and premiums, etc). An importer can no longer say "well we can't be totally responsible for everything that happens since we don't have that level of granularity on our products."
- Y-bar 3y ago
  They are actively working on improving the situation it seems: > EU criminalises environmental damage ‘comparable to ecocide’ > Directive punishes most serious cases of environmental damage, including habitat loss and illegal logging https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/17/eu-criminalises-environmental-damage-comparable-to-ecocide https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/17/eu-crimi...

by furyg3 3y ago

FirmwareBurner 3y ago

>everyone is suddenly actually really researching their supply chains in the run up to new EU deforestation laws requiring this due diligence How effective will that be on preventing illegal deforestation? A lot of illegal deforestation in the EU(Romania) is going on under the noses of the authorities which are complicit and help the local logging mafia get clean papers for their wood, and turn a blind eye to checks and help fudge reports as it's multi hundred million Euro industry thanks to huge demand from wood manufacturers in Germany and Austria who don't care how and where that timber comes form as long as it's dirt cheap and has clean looking papers. The logging mafia has no remorse to hurt or kill people getting in between them and their 7-9 figure revenues, let alone give a toss about cooking the books or fudging some traceability reports. Your agri-food traceability software seem more as solutions the big wood consuming mega corporations like IKEA can use to say "look, the traceability software says we're complaint, m'kay", to get out of a pickle when being caught red handed with tainted raw materials. The exact same thing is happening with the "ethically sourced" cocoa and coffee beans, which is often farmed by the same slave labor. Unless there's heavy policing by non-corruptible third parties, across the entire supply chains, and enough guilty people go to jail to send a strong message, traceability solutions and ethically sourced stickers don't mean jack shit as the paperwork can easily be fudged by system savvy people looking to make money.

furyg3 3y ago
As always, it's complex. The EUDR is focused on items originating outside the single market. It does not outline specific measures or tooling, outside of mandating things like containers must be accompanied by documentation showing the specific locations of origin (polygons of fields, or GPS points if the fields are small), as well as quantities from those locations and accompanying due diligence reports, that are to (eventually) be submitted to a central repository. If they don't, the products cannot be sold on the market, and companies may be susceptible to fines. Deforestation is something that is possible to monitor in various ways, including via satellite imagery. But some form of independent risk analysis and ground-truthing will almost certainly be part of any due-diligence process. I'm already seeing companies shy away from some 'legal' fields that are suspiciously close to protected areas that are undergoing / have undergone recent deforestation (which is also a risk, by the way, that farmers are punished for things outside their control). But what I'm saying is that right now companies either a) make their own rules, and own the communication space when they don't achieve them or b) subscribe to voluntary programs (rainforest alliance, fair trade, etc) which also have limited resources and where some conflict of interest can exist. Soon, companies will be legally responsible and this is a large culture shift, basically moving the problem from the CSR/ESG department to the sourcing department, which is where the deals are truly made. I expect that initial enforcement will be lax as everyone gains experience and adjust to the new situation, and there will (of course) be fraud. This will probably be mostly done in origin (when Nestle says jump a chocolate exporter says 'how high?'). But soon regulatory authorities will have databases of (traceable) products to field level and can correlate... only so much of product X can come from field Y, etc. And, by virtue of companies having to implement traceability to field level, much more can be said about other issues (child labor, wages and premiums, etc). An importer can no longer say "well we can't be totally responsible for everything that happens since we don't have that level of granularity on our products."
Y-bar 3y ago
They are actively working on improving the situation it seems: > EU criminalises environmental damage ‘comparable to ecocide’ > Directive punishes most serious cases of environmental damage, including habitat loss and illegal logging https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/17/eu-criminalises-environmental-damage-comparable-to-ecocide https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/17/eu-crimi...