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Supply Chains and Trade

“Once the company came, and had our land signed off, they framed us as thieves for harvesting our own crops in our own farms. For three months we were locked up.” - Pak Kual, Dayak Agabag peoples, Bebenas village, Kalimantan

In response to human rights violations and environmental destruction fuelled by global demand for commodities, FPP works with indigenous peoples and forest peoples to reform commodity production and associated supply chains and trade through engagement with voluntary certification schemes and multi-stakeholder initiatives, pursuing legal avenues where they exist and pushing for the development of new corporate accountability legislation.

Context

Expanding industrial agriculture and intensified extraction of natural resources in tropical countries continue to cause harm to indigenous peoples and forest peoples, who find themselves at the far upstream end of global supply chains. The production of commodities traded in global markets - such as soy, palm oil, sugar, cacao, beef, timber, pulp, paper, minerals, metals and hydrocarbons - is a major cause of deforestation and often happens through the taking of indigenous peoples’ and forest peoples’ customary lands without their free, prior and informed consent (FPIC). In addition to causing harms to local and traditional food systems, to water and to health, such incursions continue to disrupt the cultural and social fabric of communities.

Today, it is our analysis that sugar cane monocultures in the ancestral territories of our community have only served to perpetuate misery, given that our territories previously enjoyed subsistence security through cocoa cultivation from on traditional farms alongside other native crops and economic activities.”

Leidy Mina, afro-descendant community leader, Palenke Alto Cauca

Aims

Through our work with partners and allies, FPP seeks reform of global supply and value chains to ensure that the internationally recognised and protected rights of indigenous peoples and forest peoples are protected and respected by states and corporate actors.

Our Work

The work towards these aims includes:

  • engagement with voluntary commodity certification standards and associated methodologies to elaborate, and push for the implementation of, strong human rights language (e.g. Roundtable for Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance (IRMA), High Carbon Stock Approach (HCSA) and High Conservation Value (HCV));
  • engagement in multi-stakeholder initiatives for sustainable and ethical supply chains (including the Palm Oil Collaboration Group (POCG), Tropical Forest Dialogue (TFD), Palm Oil Transparency Coalition (POTC) and the Accountability Framework Initiative (AFI)
  • hosting the facilitation of the Zero Tolerance Initiative , which seeks to confront intimidation, violence and killings of human rights defenders in agribusiness and extractive industries and associated supply chains;
  • pushing for supply chain and corporate accountability regulations in exporter and importer countries to include strong protections for the rights of indigenous peoples and forest peoples.
  • accompanying indigenous peoples and forest peoples to seek remedy where they have experienced violations of their rights as a result of commodity production.

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