The food industry and retail has significant impacts on biodiversity. However, biodiversity barely plays a role for many companies in the industry. Goal of the project is the anchoring of biodiversity preservation through standards and seals of quality used by the food industry. With input from relevant stakeholders, the GNF and the Lake Constance Foundation develop concrete criteria for protecting biodiversity. In a further step, standard setting organizations and companies with independent labels are encouraged to adopt the criteria.
Companies such as the REWE Group have already pledged their cooperation and willingness to integrate the criteria in their own guidelines in the areas of agricultural and food production. Thereby, biodiversity criteria can use certified standards to become “state of the art” in the food industry. The German Federal Environment Agency and the Federal Environment Ministry support the initiative.
Further Literature
Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity
CBD Technical Series No. 63 (2011)
Review of the biodiversity requirements of standards and certification schemes: A snapshot of current practice