By Rachel Sherrington, an investigative researcher and reporter based in Brussels, and Hazel Healy, DeSmog’s UK Editor. Originally published at DeSmog.
This week, as business and government leaders, investors and campaigners gather for New York Climate Week, DeSmog is relaunching its big agriculture series, which will scrutinise the power of food and farming companies.
Agriculture used to play second fiddle to energy when it came to global warming, considered as a nice-to-have. But as global heating continues apace, emissions associated with food are rising fast.
Nitrous oxide – a planet-heating gas nearly 300 times as potent as CO2 when measured over 100 years – is accumulating in Earth’s atmosphere at unprecedented levels. Levels of methane – another powerful greenhouse gas critical to reducing emissions – have soared since the start of the decade and are showing “no hint of decline”.
But while the science shows that food systems are fuelling global heating, the world’s largest agriculture companies continue to argue that they are the solution to climate breakdown.
This claim comes as evidence mounts that major agribusiness polluters are using their sizeable economic and political clout to block environmental legislation worldwide – and as the emissions footprints of the largest meat and dairy firms’ continue to grow.
DeSmog’s renewed focus on agriculture comes ahead of a pivotal and eventful year for climate, and food politics, with major summits related to biodiversity, energy and food due over the coming months in Colombia and Azerbaijan this year.
The COP30 climate summit in Brazil in the city of Belém follows in 2025, in the gateway to the Amazon rainforest – the world’s most important biome.
These summits matter because the future of agriculture is tied not only to global heating but to nourishing human populations – and key to preserving the habitats and species with which we share our world.
Food and farming is both driving global heating and falling victim to its impacts. This year an extreme weather phenomenon made harsher and more frequent by climate change killed 7.1 million cattle, sheep and goats in Mongolia. Known as a dzud, this combination of drought and severe winters wiped out more than a tenth of the country’s herds.
In Jamaica Hurricane Beryl destroyed over $6.4 million worth of food crops and supporting infrastructure in the country, leaving devastating communities facing food shortages after it swept through the country this July.
These events underline why in an annual assessment the UN agency the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has now identified climate change as one of the key drivers of food insecurity, and warned that accelerating climate risks threaten to send global efforts to address world hunger backwards.
The farming industry is also directly imperilling our natural world. Agriculture is the leading driver of biodiversity loss, and responsible for 80 percent of land use change, which is resulting in deforestation rates of around 10 football pitches a minute.
As world leaders prepare for crunch talks at the COP30 climate summit, which will take stock of climate efforts in the last five years and ask governments to show greater ambition in the face of the current planetary emergency, they can expect company from corporations with a vested interest in the status quo.
A major report released in July found that the world’s largest meat and dairy companies – some of whose emissions rival those of countries – are using a slew of tactics borrowed from the fossil fuel and tobacco industries to block action on climate.
A landmark assessment from the World Health Organisation has also found that Big Food companies – including those from the meat and dairy sector – have used a range of tactics to derail European health policy, which it estimated has led to thousands of early deaths in the region.
Policies to Play for
We anticipate that big agribusiness will be stepping up its PR and influencing efforts at a time when food is high on the multilateral agenda. Ahead of the COP30 climate summit in Brazil, which is of course home to some of the world’s largest agribusiness companies like meat giant JBS, countries will be asked to submit new plans to reduce emissions in agriculture.
On the road to Belém, we’ll be covering other touchstone moments where industry’s influencing efforts are likely to be in full swing – including two major summits this year.
First up is the biodiversity summit, COP16, this October – a fora which has been of increasing interest to agrichemical giants over recent years, as governments are increasingly called on to tackle climate and nature emergencies together.
Shortly after COP16, we’ll be tracking industry’s boots on the ground at the COP29 climate summit, which will take place soon after in Baku, Azerbaijan. Expected to be top of the agenda is finance, which large agribusiness in countries such as the EU and US have proved adept at hoovering while globally smallholders continue to miss out on green subsidies.
Like last year, the climate summit will offer agribusiness multiple routes to influence. Baku – another host with an alarming record on human rights and climate to follow on from the COP28 in Dubai in 2023 – will play host to hundreds of industry delegates, and host a dedicated food day, side events, at least one food initiative and agriculture-focused pavilions.
Azerbaijan’s COP coincides with the G20, a two-day gathering of world leaders hosted by Brazil, where crises climate and hunger will be up for discussion (and where agribusiness has already given a taste of the messaging it will be using).
In addition to covering these summits, DeSmog will continue to scrutinize the terms favoured by industry in its ‘net-zero’ plans terms, such as the promise of a shift “regenerative agriculture”, which is due to be enshrined in new voluntary initiatives, such as Regen10, next year.
DeSmog will also be digging into misleading arguments that the world’s largest food companies are the panacea to hunger and food security – a prevalent rallying cry.
After last year’s COP, meat industry bosses left the summit galvanised for what’s to come and vowed to “keep pushing”.
As the battle for the future of food heats up and countries are asked to submit new ambitious targets we’ll be keeping tabs on industry’s counter-offensive.
