A WILDER PLANET.

The goal of protecting Nature underpins all our work. It inspires and drives us to secure a future that allows life to flourish.

In the United Kingdom, we’ve been working across the beef, soy, palm oil, cocoa and biomass industries to eliminate deforestation from UK supply chains and protect biodiversity around the world.

Latin American soy

Due to campaigning by Mighty Earth, most supermarkets have stopped and substantially reduced beef imports from Brazil – largely due to the risk of deforestation.The UK’s exposure to Latin America deforestation comes in the form of soy, grown throughout Latin America and causing thousands of hectares for deforestation every year, and threatening people and animals alike.

The UK imports 3 million tonnes of soy every year, the majority of which comes from Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay. It is estimated over 90% is used to feed animals, which end up on supermarkets market shelves in the form of chicken, pork and beef.

Mighty Earth campaigns across the supermarkets such as Tesco, Sainsburys and Waitrose to ensure these companies use their massive purchasing power to demand the soy they buy is deforestation-free, and set ambitious plant-based targets to ensure we reduce the greenhouse gas emissions from the industrial meat sector. To ensure the UK can meet its climate goals,  the Government’s own task-force, recommended a 50% reduction in meat products by 2050.

UK links to deforestation in Asia

A good example of our work in Asia  has been focused on stopping the development of the Batang Toru dam, located in North Sumatra, Indonesia. The dam, funded by Chinese State Development & Investment Corporation (SDIC), which owns and operates several major wind farms in the United Kingdom through their wholly owned subsidiary, Red Rock Power, based in Edinburgh. Our campaign aims to end the development of the dam and stop the destruction of the habitat of the Tapanuli orangutan, ‘the world’s rarest great ape, of which only 800 survive. We’re working to protect local people and workers, 18 of which have been killed from the dam’s early construction and ensure local people’s secure livelihoods. We are working with MSP’s to raise awareness of the link to Holyrood endorsed Red Rock and to persuade the company to help us to stop this destructive dam and protect the people and the unique animals who call the forest home.

Cocoa represents the UK’s biggest deforestation exposure

The UK’s exposure to deforestation is more severe from the cocoa sector and in its estimate the UK’s cocoa imports were exposed to over 65,000 hectares of deforestation – that’s 10,000 times the size of Windsor castle. Mighty Earth’s campaign is focused on Starbucks, to ensure they know where their cocoa is coming from, ensuring it’s deforestation-free and that workers have been paid a fair price for their crop.