The Access to Seeds Foundation acted as an incubator for the World Benchmarking Alliance (WBA), which was launched in September 2018. The WBA seeks to generate a movement around incentivizing the private sector’s contribution to a sustainable future for all.
WBA is set out to develop transformative benchmarks that compare companies’ performance towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The benchmarks are backed by the best available science while leveraging existing international norms and standards.
The WBA’s official launch was followed by the announcement of the development of the Food and Agriculture Benchmark. As one of the WBA’s flagship benchmarks, it will guide industries in the food and agriculture sector toward a more sustainable global food chain in line with the SDGs and targets of food system transformation.
The seed industry, with its key position at the start of the global food chain, is vital to achieving multiple sustainability targets and will be one of the industries this benchmark has in scope.
The Access to Seeds Foundation is developing a collaboration model with WBA which contributes to the Food and Agriculture Benchmark. While this benchmark takes a broad approach assessing all industries in the food chain on their contribution to global food system transformation, the Access to Seeds Index will remain a spotlight index deepening insights in the contribution of the seed industry, including small and medium sized seed enterprises at regional level.
Initial selection of industries and companies for WBA’s Food and Agriculture Benchmark now open for public consultation
WBA’s Food and Agriculture Benchmark will be the first of its kind to rank companies across the entirety of the food system from farm to fork by their impact. WBA will launch the scoping report at the EAT Stockholm Food Forum.
The report presents a longlist of over 300 keystone actors that qualify for inclusion in the benchmark, an outline of topics to address and an overview of the development process. The report is now open for feedback.
Read the Food and Agriculture scoping report
