McCain Foods joins OP2B, an initiative to enhance biodiversity in agricultural supply chains

Today, nineteen forward-thinking, agriculture-centric companies, together with the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), launched a new initiative to protect and restore biodiversity within their supply chains and product portfolios.

This coalition – named "One Planet Business for Biodiversity" (OP2B) – was formally launched on stage at the United Nations Climate Action Summit by Emmanuel Faber, Chairman and CEO of the global food and beverage company Danone.

With the planet facing an urgent climate and biodiversity situation, McCain Foods has become a founding member of the One Planet Business for Biodiversity (OP2B) coalition of leading companies.

This business-led coalition aims to gather forward-thinking, agriculture-centric companies determined to take bold action to protect and restore cultivated and natural biodiversity within their value chains. In addition to business-led actions, the coalition will engage decision makers to develop and promote policy recommendations.

Over the past several months, interested companies have analyzed their value chains, from farm to fork, to identify the most impactful levers to protect and nurture biodiversity.

This assessment led to a consensus on what will be the three main focus areas moving forward:

• Scaling up regenerative agriculture practices to protect soil health
  
  Scaling up alternative farming practices that will leverage the power of plants to keep carbon in the soil (carbon sequestration), increase the capacity of soils to hold water, enhance the resilience of their crops, support the livelihoods of their farmers, and regain the nutrient density of food while decreasing reliance on synthetic inputs. This is what OP2B calls "regenerative agriculture".


• Developing product portfolios to boost cultivated biodiversity and increase the resilience of the food and agriculture models.
  
  Increasing the number of ingredients sourced so we are less reliant on just a handful of crops, further developing provenance-based and local sourcing, and expanding the genetic variety of crops grown to regain food diversity and localized biodiversity specificity in agriculture as a powerful lever to protect and nurture biodiversity.


• Eliminating deforestation, enhancing the management, restoration and protection of high value natural ecosystems.
  
  Defining specific actions within the value chains of OP2B members that can protect and restore the world's most biodiversity-rich and fragile ecosystems, including grasslands, wetlands and forests.

The focus of the OP2B coalition aligns to McCain Foods own commitments concerning climate change, biodiversity, and soil health, which are closely interrelated to our concern for caring for the future of farming.

Agriculture is being significantly affected by unpredictable climatic volatility, which is impacting farmers’ livelihoods and increasing risks for feeding all the people on this planet.

Max Koeune, President and CEO of McCain Foods:

“At McCain we are committed to addressing the increasing impact climate change is having on global agricultural systems, on our grower partners and on our business – including the promotion of regenerative agriculture at scale.”

“However, no one company can address these global issues alone and OP2B offers a strong platform for collaborative, impactful and positive action by a broad range of major stakeholders at a global level.”

As part of McCain’s involvement in OP2B, Max Koeune will be speaking about McCain Foods commitments to biodiversity and agriculture during the United Nations General Assembly in New York on September 25, as part of the ‘unlocking the transformational power of nature’ panel event.