Cecafé and Solidaridad Foundation sign agreement focusing on sustainability in coffee farming

The Brazilian Coffee Exporters Council (Cecafé) and the Solidaridad Foundation signed a technical cooperation agreement focused on promoting the sustainability of Brazilian coffee production and developing projects aligned with the demands of the external consumer market, which has been demanding greater transparency regarding socio-environmental governance.

The first initiative of cooperation between the entities is focused on the compliance of Brazilian coffee with the European Union Regulation for Deforestation-Free Products (EUDR), which determines that coffee can only be exported to the EU if it was not produced in an area deforested after December 31, 2020.

However, according to the director of Social Responsibility and Sustainability (RSS) at Cecafé, Silvia Pizzol (in the photo above), with regard to compliance with the EUDR, it is necessary to address false positive alerts for deforestation, which can occur due to the similarity in the spectral behavior of areas occupied by native vegetation and those with coffee in formation and production.

She explains that, depending on the spatial resolution of the satellite images used in deforestation monitoring systems, the confusion between coffee areas and forests can be accentuated in regions with rugged terrain and due to the varying size of the plots in the producing regions.

“It is essential to further verify the situation of native vegetation in locations where deforestation alerts were detected after December 31, 2020, and for this reason the Solidaridad Foundation, through its Geoprocessing Department, applying high-resolution images, will reassess the areas of native vegetation in coffee-producing areas where this type of alert was identified, aiming to confirm whether this reading truly reflects reality or presents technical evidence that it was a false positive for deforestation,” he comments.

The partnership offers Cecafé-associated exporters an additional layer of environmental criteria verification within the scope of the EUDR, in addition to that already carried out within the scope of the Cecafé-Serasa Experian Platform. “This detailed analysis, based on the technical expertise of the Solidaridad Foundation, will prevent undue exclusions of Brazilian coffees from accessing the European market,” explains Silvia.

Regenerative Coffee Farming

Still within the scope of the partnership between the entities, the Cecafé Social Responsibility and Sustainability Committee learned about the Solidaridad Foundation's work strategy in regenerative agriculture, in a meeting held on September 3.

at the time, Gabriel Dedini (pictured above), Program Manager at the Foundation, presented the Refazenda initiative, which jointly addresses climate, agriculture and landscape, bringing innovative and technological solutions adapted to the Brazilian panorama.

Intervention models are defined in a participatory manner with coffee-growing families and project partners, engaging in productive landscapes that include preserved native vegetation on rural properties, well-managed coffee areas and cover crops between the rows.

According to Dedini, to advance payments for environmental services associated with regenerative agriculture models, it is essential to generate information to support a gradual and responsible transition process, with a focus on reducing emission factors through best management practices.

“In this way, it is possible to obtain established indicators to monitor the evolution of the dynamics of carbon dioxide and equivalents throughout the production cycles, to build a technical framework, applicable to the crop, ensuring the maintenance of the economic viability of the activity during the transition process to a more climate-efficient agriculture, and the socioeconomic development of coffee-growing families”, he explains.

This vision is aligned with Cecafé’s carbon agenda, as Silvia recalls. “The research promoted by the Council and conducted by Imaflora and by Esalq/USP professor Carlos Eduardo Cerri in Minas Gerais and Espírito Santo contributed to the generation of indicators that demonstrate the beneficial effect of adopting practices that are part of the scope of regenerative agriculture so that the carbon balance of coffee farming becomes more negative,” she concludes.