We focus on the small-scale farmers.

“I believe that we can make a difference in the livelihoods of small-scale farmers. That is both good for them and for FrieslandCampina, as we want to purchase in a responsible and sustainable way. Obviously, we can only make a modest contribution on a global scale, but it is really worthwhile to start somewhere and make an impact.”

“We asked ourselves: what can we do to improve in the areas of sourcing sustainably and responsibly? The aswer lies in assisting farmers to improve their livelihoods and perhaps future proof farming. Not our own dairy farmers but farmers we purchase raw materials from in other parts of the world. Perhaps they will be our future suppliers.”

“Our buyers as well as our customers think it is important that we work towards a more sustainable world. FrieslandCampina purchases a lot of agricultural raw materials, such as palm oil, coconut oil, fruit, cocoa, vanilla and a lot more. In this example of palm oil, this mainly comes from South-east Asia, Malaysia and Indonesia and this palm oil is produced in an increasingly sustainable way. We only source palm oil with an RSPO (Round Table for Sustainable Palm Oil) certificate and have been doing this since 2011.”

We want to support and organise initiatives to assist smallholders to improve their livelihoods an make farming more sustainable and future proof.

“In South America things are quite different. Big steps are still to be taken there. We want to support and organize initiatives to assist smallholders in other palm oil producing landscapes to improve their livelihoods an make farming more sustainable and future proof. A cooperation has been set up with external parties to join forces and work on a program called Wilmar Smallholder Support in Colombia (WISSCo2). We started supporting this initiative in training the farmers in Colombia focused on sustainable production of palm oil.

"A cycle of train the trainer, train the farmers of the small-scale farms and start doing assessments to see how they are doing. This programme was started in 2019 and has reached 450 farmers. Together we will see what this has brought the farmers at the end of 2020.”

"We source coconut oil from origins such as the Philippines the largest producer in the world today. Coconut oil today does not have any such sustainability credentials like palm oil or cocoa. The challenges in the coconut industry are real as we face diminishing farm sizes, continuity of farm and low income just to name a few. We participated as a key member in a Public Private Partnership together with several other like-minded companies in the coconut supply chain. This partnership started in 2020 and has a 4 year project timeline."

“In this initiative, we participate in a multi stakeholder initiative across the coconut platform to assess and impact the livelihoods of coconut farmers through awareness and training. We want to make coconut farming interesting again for the future farmers!”

“As we continue the journey to source responsibly, we need to focus on active participation in industry meetings, and open and transparent communication of our goals. We have also encouraged our customers to be partners in our sustainable journey through participation in public-private partnership programs. As unlocking the true value and story of sustainability is from end to end.”