At COP26 in Glasgow over the weekend, 26 governments pledged to support sustainable farming. And 95 private companies agreed to halt and reverse the decline of nature by 2030 in their own operations, including five large UK supermarkets.
The 26 nations including India, Colombia, Vietnam, Germany, Ghana, and Australia set out new agricultural policy commitments to reduce pollution and protect food supply against climate change.
The commitments included a UK pledge to engage 75 per cent of farmers in low carbon practices by 2030.
They will help to implement COP’s headline policy, the Glasgow Leaders’ Declaration on Forests and Land Use, which is now endorsed by 134 countries representing 91 per cent of the world’s forests. The Declaration aims to halt and reverse forest loss and land degradation by 2030.
The World Bank will commit to spending US$25 billion in climate finance annually to 2025 through its Climate Action Plan, including a focus on agriculture and food systems.
Commitments from private companies include supermarkets pledging to cut environmental impact across climate and nature-loss, and fashion brands guaranteeing the traceability of their materials.
World Wild Fund for Nature chief executive Tanya Steele said, “The climate and nature crisis are two sides of the same coin and we can’t turn things around unless we transform our food system, which is destroying forests and habitats in some of our most fragile landscapes.
“The commitment from leading UK supermarkets to halve the food retail sector’s environmental impact by 2030 will help millions of families make their weekly shop greener and help reverse the loss of nature.”
- Sustainable Agriculture Policy Action Agenda for the Transition to Sustainable Agriculture and Global Action Agenda for Innovation in Agriculture supporters: Australia, Uganda, Madagascar, India, Tanzania, Vietnam, Nigeria, Lesotho, Laos, Indonesia, Guinea, Ghana, Germany, Philippines, Ethiopia, UK, Colombia, Costa Rica, Morocco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Philippines, Sierra Leone, Spain, Switzerland, UAE.
