ofi's cocoa business ‘raises regenerative agriculture ambition’ with new 2030 targets

ofi (olam food ingredients), a global leader in naturally good food and beverage ingredients and food solutions, is further enhancing efforts to tackle deforestation and drive regenerative agriculture by achieving seven landscape partnerships and bringing over a million hectares under regenerative agriculture by 2030.

These new targets align with ofi’s company-wide Choices for Change strategy and will be further boosted by the cocoa business’ tree carbon stock target of 15 million trees by 2030, converting as many farms as possible to agroforestry.

This announcement coincides with the release of ofi’s 2023 Cocoa Compass Impact Report, which shares the latest sustainability progress from across its cocoa supply chain and builds on the steps taken to protect and restore cocoa landscapes.

Regenerative agriculture highlights since the launch of the Cocoa Compass in 2018 include:

8.9 million trees distributed for agroforestry programs by ofi cocoa, working with customers and partners
57,000 hectares of land rehabilitated globally
970,000 farmers trained in Good Agricultural Practices

ofi, Head of Cocoa Sustainability, Andrew Brooks, said: “Greater action and urgency will be needed to address climate change and protect nature and farmer livelihoods in the years to come. Since the launch of Cocoa Compass in 2019, we have now published four years of data and insights from our cocoa sustainability programs, partnerships, and tools, which we are using to raise our regenerative agriculture ambition and focus attention where we can make the greatest difference, including regenerative farming.”

“Change at scale requires industry, national governments, communities and civil society to work together. So, learning from the success of partnerships like RESTORE and LASCARCOCO, we plan to go faster and further by co-developing several new and ambitious multi-stakeholder landscape partnerships that create impact beyond individual programs and help to drive collective action.”

One example is a pioneering project with Mars and the German Development Cooperation (GIZ) in Indonesia, where ofi is implementing 20 hectares of agroforestry plots to test Sloping Agriculture Land Technology (SALT), an innovative technique that involves planting cocoa trees in combination with fruit trees, timber and food crops so the root systems bind the soil on the hillsides and help prevent erosion.