Questions that will be addressed in the working group include how cultivated soy finds its way to Europe. Is this done through deforestation in the Amazon and Cerrado, because soy plantations are being established there? The Dutch meat and dairy processing industry uses soy in livestock farming, but can that demand decrease? Are there alternatives? Which one? All the insights gained by the working group will be used in discussions with international, listed companies that process soy and in which insurers and pension funds invest. These so-called engagement talks are of course intended to encourage these companies to work more on a sustainable production chain.
And where can the participants in the covenants find more and better inspiration than in the field? The setting for the so-called Fieldtrip Biodiversity is the Organic Farm Veld en Beek.
Curious? Read farmer Jan's story below! Or scroll down for the stories of the other speakers.
Farmer Jan: "Sustainability doesn't just fall from the sky"
Jan Wieringa is director of Biologica (now Bionext) when he scratches his head. He is quite happy in his position, but decides to change course. "I started doing what I wanted to do when I was little: become a farmer."
That was more than twenty years ago. Together with his wife Marijke, Jan started with eight cows in 1999. Now he has fifty cows on a mixed farm (fields and meadows), with about 400 hectares of land and he sells dairy, cheese, meat, bread, vegetables and fruit to a regular clientele of about 3,300 people. Customers can pick up their products 24/7 at one of the five self-service points in the immediate vicinity. Everyone has their own key, registers with an app what he or she takes with him or her and the payment is then made by direct debit.
The Organic Farm Veld en Beek is the setting for the Biodiversity Field Trip for which about thirty interested asset managers, governments and NGOs have come to Doorwerth.
Jan talks enthusiastically about the history of the farm, about the entrepreneurs involved ("we don't have employees, but work with entrepreneurs") and about the consumer. "We do what the consumer wants," he says firmly. "That in itself is not surprising. Every entrepreneur does that, but normally in agriculture there are still a few links between farmer and customer. For example, at Campina there is a marketer who one day thinks that the consumer might like Meadow Milk. We mainly ask ourselves that kind of thing, because we already know what the consumer wants."
Farmer Jan: "DDND (Sustainable So Not Expensive) is the only solution"
and·ga·ge·ment / sense of moral obligation. That is the name Van Dale gives to the word engagement. During the Climate Work Conference 2021 at the end of last year, Richard Weurding, managing director of the Dutch Association of Insurers, already hinted that 'looking through the eyelashes, insurers are still opting for engagement for the time being'. According to him, public-private partnerships are the way forward to keep climate change manageable, among other things. At the same time, he emphasised that clarity is one of the most important conditions for being effective. "Not only in the short term, but especially in the medium term. The government must take much more control. It is constantly being said, but it is not yet getting off the ground sufficiently," says Weurding.
The international CSR agreement for the insurance sector is one of the ways in which insurers are trying to make a difference through public-private partnerships with governments and NGOs by encouraging companies in which insurers invest their customers' money to change their thinking.
With the annual theme Biodiversity, which is aimed at three large internationally operating companies, the discussion is started to prevent deforestation, and thus biodiversity loss.
Click on the image to start the video
In this video, Aegon, NN and a.s.r. explain what they mean by engagement, what accents they place during the engagement process (which was recently extended by six months) and what result they are satisfied with.
Arthur van Mansvelt: "To stop deforestation, we are looking at alternatives"
Two heads are better than one. That is the idea behind the combined working group of insurers and pension funds at the ICSR, which is now looking at the theme of biodiversity. And that was also the idea behind the double interview that chairman of the day Pieter van der Gaag had during the Fieldtrip in farmer Jan's old barn.
Insurers and pension funds each have their own IRBC (International Corporate Social Responsibility) agreement, in which they work together with industry organisations, government, trade unions and civil society organisations. The aim is to identify and prevent abuses such as exploitation, animal suffering or environmental damage. For the remaining term of the covenant, the theme of Biodiversity has been chosen and a joint working group has been set up to bring more focus to it. Nienke van der Veen of World Animal Protection (WAP) and Arthur van Mansvelt (Achmea Investment Management) are happy with this. "Together we can do much more. And moreover, in a collaboration we can both increase our impact and bring more efficiency."
The focus of the working group is on a joint case: soy production in Brazil. "To stop deforestation as a result of the construction of soy plantations, we are looking at alternatives to the soy that the Netherlands imports from Brazil," says Arthur.
After the first discussions and the collection of the necessary information, the working group has entered the next phase. In it, the members of the working group focus on four important topics: stopping deforestation, more sustainable production, alternatives to soy and replacing meat and dairy with plant-based ingredients (from animal- to plant-based).
"We are now in talks with three international companies in the food industry. In most conversations, we mainly ask a lot of questions," says Nienke. "Think of questions such as: where are you? And what are you doing about biodiversity? We can compare these companies nicely, because they all focus on regenerative agriculture. In short, this is strengthening natural resources instead of depleting them. This agricultural method focuses mainly on improving soil quality."
One of the biggest challenges concerns corporate reporting, Arthur adds. "The devil is in the detail. Figuring out exactly what companies do is difficult. What is your definition? Which targets? What are the improvements in five years' time? A little sustainability is not enough to stop the loss of biodiversity. Sometimes we have to ask a lot of questions, even if it hurts the company. Fortunately, the NGOs are good at that."
Nienke nods. "If we want companies to change their approach, we do indeed have to ask a lot of questions. How are these companies going to approach the switch from animal-based to plant-based ? And of course we can organise many webinars or have another discussion with each other, but we can also visit a farmer to see with our own eyes how it works in practice. That's why we're here today!"
Nienke van der Veen: "If we want companies to change, we have to ask a lot of questions"
Theun Vellinga: "No matter how you look at it, we pay a bill somewhere"
He has been conducting research in livestock farming for over thirty years and has a lot of (international) experience with the livestock feed chain. Theun Vellinga (Wageningen University) knows exactly where things go wrong. "We have to adjust our eating patterns and that is a hell of a job."
Theun is used to standing in front of a group and does not need a PowerPoint . He does it from memory and just starts at the beginning: what to do with soy? "If we want to achieve sustainable agriculture, we first have to look at the consumption of proteins from all people in Europe. This amounts to 105 grams per person per day (65 grams of animal protein and forty grams of vegetable protein), while for an adult 65 grams would be enough. That means that the animal proteins would already suffice, but that requires a lot of livestock and that livestock also has to be fed."
According to Theun, we can do two things: look for alternatives to soy or think about human consumption.
Theun Vellinga: "As long as we consider meat as a main dish and vegetables as a side dish, we still have a long way to go"
Curious about the report in which Theun and colleagues describe the consequences and reactions if we stop importing soy altogether? Click here.
Ruud Zanders: "If we want to feed the world fairly, we have to stop the competition between animals and humans"
"Why do we do what we do?" It is the first sheet of the presentation by Ruud Zanders, one of the founders of Kipster. On the sheet a photo of his parents. Ruud talks about the history and present of poultry farming and about the history and present of society.
Ruud comes from Venray and was raised on a farm. Both his father and his mother come from a farming family, so it was logical that he – together with his brother – took over the farm from his parents. "We did the same as our parents, continued on the same path. Almost everyone did, but fifty years ago people took to the streets and demonstrated for more meat: 'We demand meat!' Now people are demonstrating in the heart of Amsterdam and the cry is: 'Make mincemeat of the meat industry!' We produced on the basis of the former, while we were dealing with the latter. We had a turnover of 45 million, quite a lot for a farm, but we went bankrupt."
After the bankruptcy, Ruud's house was sold. He was on the street with his wife and three children, went to a rented house and wondered what to do next. "I didn't want to do what I was doing any more. And wondered: can it be done differently?"
He shows another quote in his presentation: Is it ethical to feed good food to animals? "That's the reason for founding Kipster, but I couldn't (and didn't want to) do it alone."
Together with three co-entrepreneurs (Maurits Groen, Olivier Wegloop and Styn Claessens), Ruud wants to produce eggs, but in a different way. "Our first question was: why would we do that? Does it make sense? And is there a role for animals in the food system?"
One of their most important conditions is therefore that there must be a circular food chain. "If we want to feed the world fairly, we have to stop the competition between animals and humans," says Ruud. "Research by Wageningen University (Imke de Boer and Hannah van Zanten) shows that seventy percent of agricultural land is used for animals and worldwide thirty percent of grain production is for animals. Why? We should only feed production animals with residual products from the land and from human consumption. It is downright ridiculous what we humans throw away in food."
Kipster's first farm was built in Venray, with both an indoor and an outdoor garden for the chickens. The 24,000 chickens can go outside whenever they want.
In a nutshell, Kipster is now the most environmentally friendly chicken farm with the highest animal welfare standard, which is also growing rapidly. The Kipster eggs are for sale in the Netherlands at Lidl, but soon also in America, at Kroger (the largest supermarket chain after the Walmart). In addition, talks are underway in France, Belgium, the United Kingdom and Germany. "It's not about the amount of eggs we can sell," Ruud emphasises. "We would like to tell our story and help to feed the world more fairly."
At the end of his presentation, Ruud Zanders (Kipster) had a free tip in store for those present: "From now on, only buy white eggs. These have a lower carbon footprint than brown ones." Why is that?, asks one of the participants present in the field trip. "Because a white chicken eats less than a brown one. She needs the same amount of feed to produce an egg, but less for her own maintenance due to a lower body weight."
Kees Vendrik is the new chairman of the international CSR agreement for the insurance sector. In this agreement, insurers, NGOs and the government work together to make a positive contribution to the environment, social conditions and corporate governance. The parties also want to combat violations on these themes.
In daily life, Vendrik is Chief Economist at Triodos Bank and has been a member of the Senate for GroenLinks since June 2019.
(Text: Miranda de Groene - Photography: Ivar Pel)