US agribusiness Bunge has launched a new programme to monitor soybean crops from its indirect supply chain in the Brazilian Cerrado region, an area at high risk of deforestation.
The programme aims to support grain dealers and producers by utilising monitoring systems, such as satellite and farm-scale imaging services, and fostering large-scale action in the Cerrado area to identify and track indirect purchases of soybeans.
The company says it hopes to reach 100% traceability and monitoring of its indirect soybean purchases by 2025 – Bunge currently traces and monitors 30%.
“We recognise the important role we can play in our industry. This unprecedented initiative is a way for Bunge to share with its supply chain the best practices we use to build value chains that are traceable and verifiable,” said Rob Coviello, Bunge’s chief sustainability officer and government affairs.
“We value our partnership with dealers and producers to make our supply chains increasingly productive and sustainable and we believe that solutions at-scale and with long-term impacts are only possible when all partners in the value chain, from farmers to customers, are involved and engaged,” he continued.
Through the initiative, Bunge will share its knowledge, methodologies and tools with partner dealers looking to implement or improve the social environment evaluation of their suppliers.
The pilot will be carried out in collaboration with Brazilian agricultural company Agrícola Alvorada. “Bunge’s support and expertise in monitoring and tracking is critical to the overall improvement of our supply chain. It accelerated our adaptation to market demands,” Jarbas Weis, managing director of Agrícola Alvorada, added.
Roberto Marcon, Bunge’s origination director, emphasised the importance of such monitoring systems: “Grain dealers play an important role in our industry by giving market access to small and medium-sized farmers. By helping them implement traceability and monitoring systems and tools, we are doing our part to contribute to the entire sector.”
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