EUDR compliance requires millions of polygon maps to be created, not only for cocoa farms, but for the other EUDR commodities: cattle, coffee, palm oil, rubber, soy, and wood.
Some farms have already been mapped. Many more have not, particularly in countries where there is no strong marketing board or regulator for the EUDR- relevant commodity to take the lead on compliance.
Get our partner African Cocoa Marketplace's take on the true costs of polygon mapping for farmers worldwide.
How big is the burden of polygon mapping?
In a briefing, the European Commission has described the ‘burden’ of mapping farms to create polygons as ‘very small.’
In our estimation at ACM, the task of walking a farm boundary is by no means ‘small.’
As I explained in our previous post in this series, to map a farm boundary, first you need to get to that farm. That effort can already be costly, in time, financial expense, and energy.
(I include energy because it can be physically draining to travel to cocoa farms in Africa. The roads are poor, the traffic going through or near cities and bush towns can be pretty bad, and the vehicle may be hot, crowded, and prone to breakdowns. In all, it is an exhausting experience under the best of circumstances.)
These costs must be borne by an enumerator with the right handheld device and software to do the mapping, who is likely coming from a city or bush town. They must also be borne by the farmer, unless they actually live on their farm plot - which many don’t.
Costs to farmers
John Adamnor, whose farm we visited for this series, does not live on his cocoa farm, which is located near Suhum in Ghana’s Eastern region. When we meet John on his farm, he travels there by motorbike, which involves the cost of fuel.
Unless he was planning to be on the farm that day, there is also an opportunity cost: John might otherwise have spent his time in other income-generating activities.
We are illustrating this for one farmer. But if we multiply that by the millions of farmers who must now undertake to walk the boundaries of one or more plots of land, we can see that the cost of polygon mapping is not, in fact, small.
If a representative of the EU Commission were to read this post, perhaps they would say in response that the farmer does not need to be present for the mapping of his or her plot. So in fact the costs I describe are irrelevant for farmers, and only need to be borne by the enumerator, who is hopefully getting paid for his or her work.
If that were the case, then I would say in return that I hope that person continues to follow this True Costs of EUDR series. We will be showing exactly how difficult it is to know where the boundary of a cocoa farm lies, without the experience of the person who knows the land intimately: the farmer.
ACM and its partners Orijin , Aya Data, and Demeter Holdings Ltd offer full-service EUDR compliance solutions. We go into the work with our eyes open to rural realities, the challenges and complexities involved, and the priority of protecting farmer livelihoods.
Learn more about our compliance solutions.
Special thanks to Benjamin Setor Gbadago and Kakra (Ataa-Asantewaa Martha) Ph.D. for their production support.
Article from African Cocoa Marketplace
