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18- November 19, 2015 editor@newslj.com
1 j 1:° ....
news etter ourna ooooooo°o°oooo
Todd Bennington
NLJ Reporter
As part of a series on sustain-
able beef, the NLJ spoke with
Carlos Saviani, vice president
of the World Wildlife Fund-
US's sustainable food team, on
his organization's involvement
in multi-stakeholder initiative
the Global Roundtable for
Sustainable Beef. This is the
Conclusion of an interview that
first appeared in last week's
newspaper.
NLJ: I can see how food
retailers might benefit from
marketing a product that
they can call "sustainable."
Likewise, it seems meatpackers"
get increased control or at least
visibility over their supply
chain. But in terms of time
and cost, it seems a lot of
the burden falls on producers
without obvious benefit. Can
you speak to that at all?
CS: ... I know a lot of
ranchers and I know they're
really frustrated with the fact
that people don't understand
how beef is produced. People
are not appreciative of all the
work they do to produce food
that in their view is very nutri-
tious ... So I think that's the
first burden, the social license
Then you have the ones
that are related to the journey
toward better sustainability.
When it comes to those aspects,
I think becoming more sustain-
able can also be good for busi-
ness. There is a series of papers
and studies showing that every
time a producer improves their
sustainability, in other words,
every time they do more with
less ... they end up being more
profitable. Obviously there are
some up- front investments
they have to make, and one of
the elements we want to help
the industry with is to bring the
finance side along with us. We
Ii~/¢~ been fiilkifl~ tO ~ ~ti~
of banks and trying to con-
vince them that ... it's safe for
them to invest in projects that
will drive higher sustainability.
In most of the cases, when
[producers] improve their
sustainability, following the
principles and criteria of the
GRSB, they're improving their
bottom line, which is great for
them. Every time we have that
situation happen we have a win~;~ ~%~: :~ ?~,~:~,~-~ ::!~
for them and the environment.
NLJ: Jason Clay, your senior
vice president for market trans-
formation, has talked about
influencing the 100 major food
companies and making sustain-
ability a "precompetitive" [2]
issue. What does that mean
exactly?
CS: We support the idea.
It's part of our approach to
... how we get sustainability
implemented. There are mil-
lions of producers arounds the
world. When it comes to beef
I think we're talking about 1.5
million beef producers around
the world. We cannot talk to 1.5
million people, and we cannot
talk to 7 billion consumers who
all have different ideas about
food and what sustainable food
is. But we can talk to the big
companies that are in between
those two ... that are buying,
not only beef, but all the com-
modities and retailing them to
consumers. If you look at the
biggest 400 [food companies]
... you're talking about close
to 70 percent of the trade that
happens around the world in
food commodities ...
Take for instance JBS.
JBS is the largest processor
of beef right now in the world
... They have ties with the
suppliers that are producing all
that beef, so they can elaborate
that relationship and work with
their producers to implement
sustainability practices. That's
why in all the roundtables that
we have those companies are
the first ones we invite to the
table, the first ones that we
bring along with us. By having
that, We get the energy, we get
the movement that is necessary
to then attract the producer,
the producer associations, and
The World Wildlife Fund, the world's largest conservation group, is a founding member of the Global Roundtable for Sustainable
Beef, a multi-stakeholder organization that purports to be working towards increased efficiency and reduced environmental
impacts of beef production. (Pam Penfield/NLJ)
other organizations ...
Companies like [GRSB
members] Cargill, McDonald's,
and Walmart are buying huge
amounts of beef. They're really
concerned about sustainability,
not only because they want to
keep their supply of products
and they know if they're not
sustainable, they may start to
have disruptions in that supply,
but also because they're
interested in their reputation.
They're protecting their reputa-
tion because they are respon-
sible for their whole supply
chain. If one of their suppliers
does something wrong, it can
hurt their whole brand ...
....... ............................................................... We're proud to help put:all th e
........ ................ re s u I ts for yo u r ch ild ten ! ..........
That's a precompetitive
issue ... a lot of people think
sustainability is like producing
organic or producing local
foods ... but we think we're
only going to be able to tackle
the big issues that are ahead
of us, in our case especially
environmental problems, if
we work as a whole, if we
work together with the whole
industry ... Everybody's going
to be affected. If we only have
a few players reducing the
amount of water they use to
produce food or protecting the
soil or reducing greenhouse gas
emissions, that's not going to
solve the problem ... So in
other words, we believe we
.................................................................... ............................................................................................................... Middle S c h O01 S taft ...... I
can only solve the problems
that we have if we all work
together and we treat it as a
pre-competitive issue.
NLJ: Jason Clay has written
about the necessity of walking
the line between cooperation
and violation of antitrust laws.
[3] Is there a centralizing ten-
dency here that people should
be wary of 7
CS: Obviously when we
have those meetings we follow
some laws of engagement.
We cannot discuss prices. We
cannot discuss volumes. We
cannot discuss anything that
has a commercial nature. There
are rules that you have to have
when you create a multi-stake-
holder engagement like this ...
The other thing is that when
we cooperate we all have to be
aware that we're going to have
to compromise some of our
positions ... The good thing is
that we agree, I would think,
on at least 80 percent of the
things that we discuss and the
problems that we are trying to
solve ...
NLJ: What's the WWF's
relationship to the Carbon
Disclosure Project and does
that have any bearing on
GRSB?
CS: That group is more con-
nected to our climate team.
We do cooperate with them
but [there isn't] any connection
with the Global Roundtable
for Sustainable Beef, at least
not for now. Although one of
the indicators we have been
pushing the industry to adopt is
the greenhouse gas emissions.
There's a group of [GRSB]
board members, including one
of our team members from
WWF, discussing the set of
global indicators that should
be used for measuring sustain-
ability for the beef industry.
One of them is probably going
to be greenhouse gas emissions
per hectare and per kilo of
beef. Carbon emissions is a key
element ...
NLJ: The Carbon Disclosure
Project is backed by a group of
banks who are using (environ-
mental impact-related) infor:
mation as a basis for invest-
ment. Is that correct?
CS: Yes, they want to make
sure that they are investing in
projects that are sustainable.
Projects that aren't harming the
environment. There's no direct
connectivity with the Global
Roundtable for Sustainable
Beef, at least not at this point.
NLJ: Is there anything
our readers here in Northeast
Wyoming need to know about
WWF and your work with the
Global Roundtable?
CS: I think it's important
for people to be aware that this
is a journey. Sustainability is
not a destination. It takes time.
We're dealing with the whole
industry. But the good thing
is that the process is moving
forward. We've got the prin-
ciples and criteria approved,
and now we have the national
roundtables ... working on the
development of the indicators;
I think it will be very impor-
tant to have not only Wyoming
society but Wyoming producers
and processors supporting this
initiative in a precompetitive
way.
[2] In other words, set as
an industry-wide standard not
subject to consumer preference
or other market forces.
[3] See Clay's editorial
"Precompetitive behaviour
- defining the boundaries'~
(June 2011) at http://www.the-
guardian.com/sustainable-busi-
ness/precompetitive-behav-
iour-defining-boundaries.
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