Carodenuto along with Janina Grabs, a postdoctoral researcher at ETH Zurich’s Environmental Policy Lab wants to know how, and if, these businesses can drive widespread change to sustainable farming. Each year, the world consumes about four million tonnes of cocoa, most of it grown by small farmers in West Africa. The beans then pass between middlemen along increasingly concentrated supply chains. By the time they reach supermarket shelves, over 60 per cent of the beans will have been controlled by three international commodity companies, she said. That creates an “hourglass” structure, she said. There are lots of farmers at one end and plenty of chocolate consumers at the other, but they’re only linked by a few large companies. It’s a structure replicated across most commodity supply chains, from coffee to corn.
He also said the country would continue to develop both clean coal and renewable energy sources.
In September, President Xi Jinping revealed in a surprise announcement at the UN that China would aim for carbon neutrality by 2060, and a peak in emissions by 2030.
Friday’s announcement confirmed the country’s commitment to those goals but didn’t set the kinds of sharper emissions targets that activists and environmentalists hoped might help the country meet them.
“What everyone really wanted was an earlier peaking year.”
Swithin Lui, NewClimate Institute and the Climate Action Tracker
“What everyone really wanted was an earlier peaking year,” said Swithin Lui, from the NewClimate Institute think tank and the Climate Action Tracker.
Carodenuto along with Janina Grabs, a postdoctoral researcher at ETH Zurich’s Environmental Policy Lab wants to know how, and if, these businesses can drive widespread change to sustainable farming. Each year, the world consumes about four million tonnes of cocoa, most of it grown by small farmers in West Africa. The beans then pass between middlemen along increasingly concentrated supply chains. By the time they reach supermarket shelves, over 60 per cent of the beans will have been controlled by three international commodity companies, she said. That creates an “hourglass” structure, she said. There are lots of farmers at one end and plenty of chocolate consumers at the other, but they’re only linked by a few large companies. It’s a structure replicated across most commodity supply chains, from coffee to corn.
Sophia Carodenuto is looking for ways to make food more sustainable in an unusual place: The business practices used by the companies who control the world’s chocolate trade.