Food & Retailers

Hub Description

Agriculture is an essential industry, producing much of the food, feed, energy and biomaterials that society depends on. It also generates soft values, such as open landscapes and vibrant rural communities. Agricultural ecosystems cover 38% of the land surface of the planet, making them one of the largest ecosystems in the world, but also major contributors to breaching planetary boundaries. Globally, agriculture contributes between 19 and 29% of GHG emissions, consumes 69% of water resources, disrupts phosphorus and nitrogen flows, and is one of the major drivers of biodiversity loss. Nevertheless, the impacts on biodiversity can be mitigated or even become positive if managed correctly. This is crucial, since the functioning and products of agricultural ecosystems are dependent on natural resources and biodiversity.

Companies in agriculture and further downstream, such as food producers, textile companies, and retailers, are well aware of the impacts. Many are already working on ways to improve things. However, in the agriculture, food and retail hub we have identified multiple barriers for assessing, improving, and reporting the biodiversity impact of agriculture. These include lack of reliable data, insufficient understanding of what data is needed, long and complex supply chains with multitudes of subcontractors and processing steps, lack of methods that account for the whole value chain, and low willingness of consumers to pay for sustainable production.

In CircHive project tools and approaches are tested for biodiversity footprinting of agricultural and food products  and for natural capital accounting.