As input prices surge, extreme weather is the norm and margins become tighter, food producers are making significant changes. Benchmarking to compare performance, author Lisa Jack argues, is essential to manage and assess these changes. She provides an overview of existing practices and explores the potential for them to drive sustainable innovation. 

This article investigates the current state of nutrition and sustainability of plant-based and animal-sourced products, mainly beef. It reflects upon the different metrics used in research and how they impact research results, narratives and policies. From the literature they reviewed, the authors found there to be a consensus that plant-based beef generates fewer greenhouse gas emissions than conventionally reared beef. They found it is more difficult to make nutritional comparisons due to the variability in plant-based beef products. Comparisons mainly focus on nutritional content, water use, land use and greenhouse gas emissions, but exclude social and economic sustainability. The authors highlight the impact of funding sources on the type of metrics chosen and call for more independent analysis focusing on a wider range of metrics.

NGO Feedback has published a website, Big Livestock's Big Greenwash, outlining the marketing strategies used by large livestock companies, including: reporting emissions and climate targets in ways that appear to show more progress than has happened; focusing on technological options (e.g. feed additives) to increase efficiency without reducing meat and dairy production; downplaying the climate impact of livestock; and building narratives that argue livestock production is good for farmer wellbeing, food security and traditional meat-based diets. Feedback argues that these strategies amount to greenwash.

The 2022 edition of the Global Nutrition Report discusses the commitments on tackling malnutrition made by a range of stakeholders, including governments, donors, civil society, businesses and international organisations.

This paper explores how the food industry was able to influence and weaken the 2018 Dutch prevention agreement on overweight, using documents obtained through Freedom of Information requests. It argues that so-called voluntary agreements - a form of governance developed through negotiation between public and private stakeholders - is too susceptible to industry influence, and that stronger public regulation is a better alternative.

This paper assesses the impacts of corporate zero-deforestation supply chain commitments (ZDCs) in Brazil. It finds that in the Brazilian Amazon, where the Soy Moratorium ZDC has been both adopted and implemented, the commitment reduced direct deforestation for soy by 57% between 2006 and 2015 in the municipalities that it covered. In the Cerrado, in contrast, none of the seven companies (covering 66% of soy production) that have adopted ZDCs there appear to have fully implemented them - if they had done so, deforestation for soy in the biome could have been reduced by 46% between 2006 and 2015, estimates the paper.

The Science Based Targets initiative has published guidance for companies in land-intensive sectors on how to set science-based targets for reducing emissions from agriculture, forestry and other land use in line with the Paris Agreement’s climate goals. The key components include: setting near-term emissions reduction targets for the next 5-10 years; account for carbon sequestration options such as forest management and soil carbon sequestration; set long-term targets of cutting emissions by 74% by no later than 2050; set zero deforestation targets for no later than 2025; and set emissions reduction targets for both land use and fossil fuel use.

This discussion paper from the UK’s Food Research Collaboration examines meetings between food and drink businesses and UK policymakers. It finds that publicly declared meetings of government officials with food and drink lobbyists are often described in extremely broad terms, such as “to discuss business” or “to discuss trade and agriculture”, and that other interactions with lobbyists - such as phone calls or emails - are not disclosed. Ireland and Canada both used more detailed processes to disclose lobbying activities. The report makes recommendations for improving the transparency of lobbying in the UK.

This progress report from the UK’s Food Foundation shows that UK businesses have served an additional 636 million portions of vegetables over the past four years, as part of the Peas Please initiative. The report features several case studies, including Sainsbury’s, Birds Eye, Food Cardiff, Lidl and Healthy Start, and the Community Supported Agriculture Network UK.