In this guest blog post, Bernard Giraud, President of the Livelihoods Venture & Senior Advisor forSustainability and Shared Value Creation at Danone, outlines the ways the private sector can ensure the Sustainable Development Goals are met. This is part of our ongoing series on the state of the Sustainable Development Goal negotiations.

“Our role is not just to sell a bottle of water or a cup of yoghurt. It’s much more than that. We need to look after our ecosystem, and what is more important in our ecosystem than the farmer selling to us milk, fruits, coffee, chocolate and so forth?”

These words come from Frank Riboud, Chairman, Board of Directors at Danone, and sum up the way big businesses are now looking at their supply chains. We know that smallholders make up over 70 per cent of the world’s production of raw materials – that’s the cocoa, sugar and vanilla that businesses buy in huge quantities to make your favorite foods. They depend on these farmers. Yet millions of them remain impoverished, struggling to produce their crops on degraded lands, with limited access to the tools, technology and skills they need to boost their production, protect the environment and secure their own livelihoods. Continue reading →