Responsible Business
Coffee
As one of the world’s leading coffee merchants, recognizing that responsible sourcing can benefit all coffee value chain stakeholders, help safeguard ecosystems and mitigate the effects of climate change, sustainability is central to our business model and decisions.
This is why in 2022, the Coffee Platform developed and launched LDC’s Responsible Sourcing Program, supporting our goal to trace at least 20% of our coffee volumes to farm through suppliers who signed our Global Coffee Supplier Code of Conduct, while we pursue our important groundwork related to responsible sourcing and sustainability projects in origination countries.
Empowering Farming Communities
In 2022, LDC implemented 12 projects with social targets, reaching more than 26,000 beneficiaries overall. Activities ranged from training women to use more fuel-efficient stoves, to youth education in coffee growing communities.
As part of our commitment to act for living income improvements, LDC also formally joined the ICO Coffee Public-Private Task Force, signed the London Declaration on price levels, price volatility and the long-term sustainability of the coffee sector, and is supporting the Living Income Benchmark Accelerator Project.
Importantly, LDC also launched the Stronger Coffee Initiative in 2022, with the goal to work alongside other coffee supply chain stakeholders to empower farming communities to succeed and thrive.
Guided by a vision for a world where ‘every cup of coffee improves lives and the planet’, the initiative takes a holistic approach organized across three complementary pillars: farmer prosperity, low carbon and regenerative agriculture.
This approach will guide our work over the coming years, working toward the various goals outlined below leading up to 2027, with an ambition to support 30,000 coffee farmers to become more prosperous through this initiative.
Protecting the Environment
In 2022, working alongside various partners, LDC implemented 12 projects with environmental targets, with activities that included the renovation of coffee farms (distributing 245,000 seedlings in 2022) and the training of thousands of farmers on low-carbon agriculture.
LDC also started a baselining exercise to collect primary data on Scope 3 greenhouse gas emissions in selected supply chains, using the Cool Farm Tool. This exercise will be completed in 2023 and give a clearer picture of emissions in LDC’s coffee supply chains.
Also working pre-competitively on this topic, LDC participated in the Green Invest Asia project launched by Nestlé, JDE Peet’s and USAID, to establish a carbon footprint for two key global Robusta origins in Vietnam and Indonesia, as part of an unprecedented collaboration between the world’s two largest coffee buyers and ten of their supply chain partners.
Case Study
Indonesian Coffee Farmers
In 2022, LDC conducted a study with Indonesian coffee farmers, designed in conjunction with PUR, a global player in Nature Based Solution projects, and Migunani, a non-profit research organization based in Indonesia.
The study assessed the impact of good agricultural practices (GAPs) and agroforestry on soil health and coffee farmer productivity and incomes, and explored the key drivers for coffee farmers’ decisions on whether or not to adopt GAPs.
The study concluded that although the introduction of GAPs and agroforestry was successful relative to control groups, more action is needed to support and encourage coffee farmers, including more extensive promotion of GAPs and market-level assistance to give farmers access to the necessary funds to apply GAPs.
The study also recommended intensive assistance to farmers with regard to soil amendments that improve nutrient availability and retention, including fertilizers, and supplying additional anti-erosion measures for coffee plots on slopes above 15%.
Traceability in Focus
Although our Coffee Platform benefits from having its own sourcing networks, mills, warehouses and export operations, complete traceability relies on data that resides in many different systems.
Recognizing the importance of traceability, in 2022 we invested to develop a consolidated data lake that will ultimately allow us to provide customers and suppliers with accurate and more timely traceability information about coffee deliveries.
Targets
Develop and launch LDC Responsibly Sourced Verified program
Completion: 2022
Status: Complete
70% of all coffee sourced from suppliers who have signed LDC’s Code of Conduct
Completion: 2025
Status: Complete
20% of coffee supplied by signatories of LDC’s Code of Conduct, with traceability to farm
Completion: 2025
Status: Complete
New Targets
Complete farm-level Scope 3 emissions baselining exercise for selected certified coffee supply chains
Completion: 2023
Source at least 80% of coffee from RSP-approved supply chains
Completion: 2027
Support 30,000 farmers globally to improve and diversify their income
Completion: 2027
Support the production of 180,000 MT of third party-verified, low-carbon coffee
Completion: 2027
Plant at least 1.2 million shade trees globally in coffee agroforestry systems
Completion: 2027
Launch regenerative agriculture and soil restoration across 100,000 ha of coffee farmland
Completion: 2027
Use 99% electricity from renewable sources to power LDC’s coffee assets
Completion: 2027
Reduce scope 1 & 2 emissions by 33.6%
Completion: 2030
You may also be interested in
Farmer Engagement
Tens of thousands of farmers worldwide were empowered and supported to adopt more sustainable practices.
Responsible Sourcing
We began work toward a Group-wide responsible sourcing policy and grievance protocol.
Environment
Responsible in everything we do, we work with stakeholders across our value chains to conserve the natural resources and ecosystems we all depend on.