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Rainforest Ecosystems and Sustainable Livelihoods Secured as Sales of Rainforest Alliance Certified Products Reach $1 Billion Annually
October 4, 2007
Sales of Rainforest Alliance Certified sustainable coffee, bananas and chocolate surpassed US $1 billion in 2006 and the growth is projected to continue, according to the Rainforest Alliance, a leader in sustainable agriculture, forestry and tourism. Increasing consumer demand for sustainably produced products has helped sustain rapid growth of Rainforest Alliance certification in coffee, forestry and other crops. For example, the volume of sales of coffee from Rainforest Alliance Certified farms has almost doubled each year since 2003 from 7 million pounds to 54.7 million pounds in 2006; sales in 2007 are projected to exceed 91 million pounds. Announcing the figures at a Taste of Sustainability event in London, Chris Wille, Chief of Sustainable Agriculture, said: "The United Kingdom has been at the forefront of global demand for sustainably grown goods and companies large and small are responding by putting sustainability at the heart of their sourcing strategies. These commitments are delivering real benefits to more than a million farm workers and their families as well as the environment on which they depend." Seven United Kingdom Highlights in 2007 1. Good Natured juice launches this month made from oranges from the Rainforest Alliance Certified Del Oro farm in Costa Rica;
As of August 2007 the Rainforest Alliance has certified 14,892 small family farms, plantations and cooperatives in 14 countries putting 752,712 acres (304,742 hectares) of farmland and associated ecosystems under sustainable management and benefiting more than 1.5 million farmers, farm workers and their families. The Rainforest Alliance forestry programme has certified 104 million acres (42 million hectares) of forestland. Chris Wille said: "Our work in the last twenty years has not only helped conserve vast areas of forestland and other natural resources worldwide. It has also catalysed cooperation between former adversaries: environmentalists and big business. We've encouraged the emergence of a more environmentally and socially responsible corporate culture, which in turn is helping tip global markets towards sustainable practices." Rainforest Alliance certification is an external, third-party, voluntary system. It works with a network of specialist non-profit sustainable agriculture organisations -- the Sustainable Agriculture Network -- to create rigorous, independent standards for environmental and social sustainability, including habitat and ecosystem conservation, reforestation, integrated pest management, worker protection, access to medical care, education, and community investment. Producers that meet the standards obtain Rainforest Alliance certification, and earn the right for their products to bear the Rainforest Alliance Certified seal. Beyond its environmental programmes in agriculture, forestry and tourism, the Rainforest Alliance plans to expand its work to include sustainable cattle ranching and the sustainable production of palm oil, sugar and other biofuel crops. "These new areas are not chosen at random," Wille said. "They are the strategic lynchpins which are most likely to head off the worst environmental impacts looming before us, and to leverage the farthest-reaching opportunities we have in this century to protect the environment and the billions of people whose livelihoods are based on natural resources." Editor's notes:
1. According to the 2006 Co-operative Bank's Ethical Consumerism Report United Kingdom ethical consumerism was worth £29.3 billion in 2005. The Report, which is published in conjunction with The Future Foundation, shows that ethical consumerism in 2005 was up 11 per cent on the previous year.
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