ABIOVE Contributes to the Consultation on Deforestation

The Association also sent additional data on Brazilian soy, thus contributing to the work of the European Commission

SÃO PAULO, Dec. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- ABIOVE, the Brazilian Association of Vegetable Oil Industries, this week sent its contribution to the public consultation being held by the European Commission on a "Deforestation and Forest Products Impact Assessment".  ABIOVE and its members, the companies responsible for the industrialization and exportation of oilseeds, especially soy, in Brazil, recognise their responsibility to guarantee a sustainable production chain for their consumer markets.

The Association welcomes the European Commission's initiative to seek ways of containing deforestation through open dialogue.  In its contribution, the Association emphasised the need for the initiative to allow implementation of measures that meet the interests of both the consumer countries and those responsible for the production and exports.

As well as the answers to the European Commission's questionnaire, ABIOVE filed an additional document with information on the presence of soy in the Cerrado and Amazon Biomes, showing that soy crops cannot be considered responsible for deforestation in Brazil.  ABIOVE understands that discussions on what should be done to contain deforestation globally must be based on clear information and technical data.

In this additional document, ABIOVE showed that soy today occupies only 1.3% of the Amazon Biome.  Soy crops in this Biome have been monitored since 2006 through the Soy Moratorium, which blocks acquisitions of soy produced in areas of the Amazon Biome that were deforested after 2008 and encourages expansion into areas already cleared.  In 2019, just 1.8% of all the soy produced in the Amazon Biome originated from areas deforested after 2008, and none of this production entered the supply chain of ABIOVE's members.

It further showed that soy expansion in the Cerrado Biome has fallen over the years, going from 215 hectares per year to 73 hectares per year, mainly in areas already cleared.  Currently, soy crops are planted on 8% of the Cerrado's territory, with just 7% of the soy expansion between 2014 and 2019 occurring in areas newly deforested.

FSB Comunicação
e-mail: abiove@fsb.com.br
website: www.abiove.org.br