Dear friends,

2020 was the final year of UEBT’s previous strategic plan. We accomplished a great deal: the launch of our certification label, the revision of the Ethical BioTrade standard, significant growth in company commitments and actions, and most importantly, increased impacts across hundreds of ingredients from biodiversity.

During the cycle of the strategic plan we doubled our membership (from 34 to 68 companies) and increased the number of supply chains undergoing sourcing improvements by more than 120% (from 400 to more than 900).

We now launch the next strategy which will take us to 2024, and it proves to be our most ambitious yet. We plan to again double membership, expand our work in herbs & spices and flavours, and see 100 ‘biodiversity action plans’ implemented by companies all over the world. We will also begin to collaborate on issues-based campaigns with the growing number of brands that have joined UEBT.

All this work is grounded in the commitments our members make on ethical sourcing and on promoting positive impact for people and biodiversity. We thank them all for their ambition and their accountability.

Let’s get to work shaping a world in which all people and biodiversity thrive!

Bas Schneiders, Board President

Rik Kutsch Lojenga, Executive Director

Field verification in sesame fields, Uganda - with UEBT’s Standards and Certification Expert Jerida Sinange (right)

Testing of the Biodiversity Action Plan (BAP) in Western Ghats, India biodiversity hotspot - with UEBT’s M&E and Biodiversity Expert Simona D’Amico (center) and India Representative Sureel Singh (left)

Regenerative practices

Companies working with UEBT are contributing to regenerating natural systems. Regenerative practices are ways in which cultivation and wild collection activities contribute to the natural processes that take place in an ecosystem, such as carbon capture, climate regulation, water purification and food provision.

The UEBT standard’s principles on conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity promotes regenerative practices such as:

Maximising biodiversity
Conserving or improving soil health
Conserving or improving water conditions
Preventing and mitigating the negative impact of the use of agrochemicals

Through our Biodiversity Action Plan approach, UEBT member companies in 2020 took steps to regenerate nature in their sourcing areas and beyond.

Case studies

Business and biodiversity

In 2020 as part of our Digital Dialogues series, we held an event called ‘Visions that shape a sector’ - with more than 500 people watching several CEOs discuss their visions for the future and how business can contribute more to biodiversity. Here are some excerpts:

Joao%2BPaulo%2Bpicture.jpg — **Joao Paulo B. Ferreira, CEO, Natura & Co Latin America**

On Brazil’s biological and culture wealth and how his early visits to Amazon communities shaped his later career and work with Natura employees:
“This country and those communities could be leading the low carbon economy with so much wealth in terms of ingredients, the forest, nature, the knowledge, and yet all is being wasted because there is no coordination, science and technology are not properly deployed and there are some ideological disputes on how to best use this wealth. So, I discovered I could do something to help this, through my work, and that is what I have been trying to do ever since, to push people in that direction so that they open their eyes and use their creativity and talent to use the richness of the bio-economy to transform the world.”

**Elisa Aragon, CEO, Nelixia**

On whether we are putting ‘bandaids’ on these huge challenges or whether we need an entirely new system:
“Everyone must act. But the private sector has a good chance of really changing things on the ground. This is why we need to make sustainability and all the strategies we are talking about, mainstream. So that day by day we move the entire sector.”

**Sebastien Sieben, CEO, Martin Bauer Europe**

Answering a question about blockchain from the audience, and a question from Maria Julia Oliva, the UEBT moderator about what in the future will ‘change the game’ in terms of sustainability:
“Transparency is the game changer, not blockchain. For many countries for decades the secret they guarded the most was their supply chains because that is really the intellectual property of trading and production companies and now suddenly you take a different approach and you say ‘I will put everything in that area on the table’ and companies that are willing to do that, that is the game changer. The game changer is the willingness to be transparent about supply chains rather than keep it as a business secret. And then there are technologies of how to do that. But blockchain is not the gamechanger. The change in attitude is the game changer.”

**Michael Brenner, Member of the Executive Board, Weleda Group**

In response to an audience member who asked how Weleda promotes ethical sourcing with suppliers and how it measures supplier success related to the company mission:
“One of the most important things for our vision is that we have direct partnerships with our suppliers. That is the most critical thing. With them we are defining projects, we are promoting their stories with customers. And so on. And we are in a very lucky position because we are a purpose-driven organisation and it helps that all partners are driving in the same direction. And finally, the luckiest thing is that we have owners that allow us to do this.”

Our focus over the last three years

Our strategic priorities from 2017 to 2020 were:

Some achievements:

UEBT new brand look and feel

UEBT certification label launched in the market
UEBT online platform Grove installed
Civil society leaders joined UEBT Board
Multiple experts joined UEBT staff team
Number of committed companies working with UEBT grew by 30+
‘The Big Shift: Business for biodiversity’ published
Biodiversity Barometer reached 10 years of tracking increasing consumer awareness of biodiversity

‘Sourcing with Respect’ conference in Paris doubled in size to 300 attendees
Partnership began with Rainforest Alliance on Herbs & Spices
Launched the Initiative for Responsible Carnauba
Biodiversity Action Plan approach launched and implemented by several UEBT members. UEBT documented and shared several case studies
10 years of the Nagoya Protocol was marked by leaders signaling support for Access and Benefit-sharing (ABS) and acknowledging UEBT’s leadership in the field

UEBT label making of

Weleda product with UEBT label in a store, 2020

And in 2020…

11 new members welcomed into UEBT in 2020 including industry leaders Sederma, Yves Rocher, Southern Cross Botanicals and more
Native became first food brand to obtain UEBT ethical sourcing system certification
Digital Dialogues reached 700 people (live unique attendees)
Developed unique online tool to monitor and assess ABS rules
Revised the Ethical BioTrade Standard
Renewed our partnership with the UN Convention on Biological Diversity
New partnerships forged with Sustainable Spices Initiative, Science Based Targets Network, the International Fragrance Association, and the International Organisation of the Flavor Industry
5 new board members joined UEBT

Logo 2017

New logo

Old publication

New publication look

Sourcing with respect

Today UEBT members are improving sourcing practices in more than 900 supply chains in 81 countries.

In the last strategic plan cycle, our membership doubled, countries of impact grew 25% and supply chains under improvement grew by more than 120%. Check our 2020 M&E report here.

Our impact since 2017…

Ethical BioTrade Standard

After a public consultation process that reached 130 people and 60 organisations globally, UEBT published its revised Ethical BioTrade Standard in 2020. We announced the new standard with a short video and communicated the new improvements such as:

Better guidance on biodiversity conservation
A greater focus on regenerative practices
A more outcome-based approach
More guidance on cost calculation and fair price
Better alignment with legal and policy developments related to ABS
Further alignment with UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights
Further alignment with ILO conventions
A continuous improvement approach

Ethical BioTrade Standard - 2 minute overview video

Screenshot 2021-03-30 at 10.18.08.png — UEBT revised Ethical BioTrade Standard

Download the standard

Fair and equitable benefit sharing

UEBT is internationally recognised for its expertise on access and benefit-sharing (ABS) - from the concepts and principles established in the Nagoya Protocol to navigating national rules and supporting permitting and negotiation processes around the world.

In the last three years, UEBT has supported companies through training and advisory services, guiding them in setting up ABS due diligence systems, conducting ABS assessments for specific ingredients and benefit-sharing negotiations. UEBT also collaborated with companies, governments and international organisations to promote ABS legal frameworks that are more practical and have a positive impact on the ground.

In 2020, UEBT launched a unique tool to help businesses in their due diligence on ABS. The UEBT tool on ABS is a continuously updated platform that contains information on existing rules on ABS around the world and insights into their scope, requirements and practical application. Additionally, the ABS technical exchange in our 2020 Digital Dialogues, always popular for its practical information and guidance, had 450 live attendees, and an additional 300 views of its video recordings.

UEBT celebrates the 10 year anniversary of the Nagoya Protocol by interviewing stakeholders about its importance in this five minute 2020 video

UEBT members

UEBT welcomed ten new members in 2020 based in Australia, Brazil, France, Panama, Spain, Thailand, Vietnam and Uruguay.

New UEBT members in 2020

All UEBT members as of March 2021

See all members here.

Financials

Find UEBT’s statement of financial position for the year 2020 below.

1 - Due to Covid there was no physical conference organised in 2020. Instead the 'Digital dialogues' events were held.2 - Dutch government support on staff costs over period Mar - May 2020 and Jun - Sep 20203 - 2019 figure includes the UEBT standar… — *1 - Due to Covid there was no physical conference organised in 2020. Instead the 'Digital dialogues' events were held.*
*2 - Dutch government support on staff costs over period Mar - May 2020 and Jun - Sep 2020*
*3 - 2019 figure includes the UEBT standard revision costs and board travel*

UEBT Staff

Europe-based team meeting, September 2020, The NetherlandsFrom bottom to top, left to right: Simona, Karène, Nelly, Jerida, Julia, Charlotte, Chloé, Adélie, Jennifer, Rodrigo, Bertjan, Rik — Europe-based team meeting, September 2020, The Netherlands
*From bottom to top, left to right: Simona, Karène, Nelly, Jerida, Julia, Charlotte, Chloé, Adélie, Jennifer, Rodrigo, Bertjan, Rik*

The UEBT team is spread across eight countries. Like so many organisations, we have not had an all-staff in-person meeting in more than a year (at the time of the writing of this annual report in March 2021). It has been a tough time, but we are grateful to have such a resilient and wonderful team.

See all staff here.

*Representation and Offices in 2020 in the Netherlands, India, Madagascar, Vietnam and Brazil.Remote Offices in Canada, France and Peru. — *Representation and Offices in 2020 in the Netherlands, India, Madagascar, Vietnam and Brazil.
Remote Offices in Canada, France and Peru.

Annual report 2020