Submission to Bonsucro re Production Standard V5 (2019-21)

In July 2020, CCSI made a formal submission to Bonsucro, an international multi-stakeholder initiative and certification scheme concerned with promoting sustainable sugar cane production. The submission formed part of consultations for Bonsucro’s draft Production Standard version 5. CCSI’s submission focused on challenges associated with implementing, and auditing for compliance with, three aspects of Bonsucro’s draft standard, namely: obtaining the free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) of Indigenous and traditional communities when establishing or expanding sugar production operations; implementing transparent and participatory processes to assess, monitor, and evaluate the environmental and social impacts of new and existing projects; and establishing accessible dispute resolution and grievance mechanisms that allow communities to raise and resolve problems. The submission proposed a concrete solution to complement Bonsucro operators’ efforts to more effectively meet that Standard in practice: a Basket Fund for Responsible Investment