Food Forests Can Connect Corporate Social Responsibility With Sustainable Development Goals

Executive Chairman & Group CEO of Dake Group, an Advocate of Innovation & Sustainability – Focused on Food Security and Water Conservation.

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Companies and consortiums all over the world allocate considerable monetary resources and human capital to corporate social responsibility, and many such initiatives lean toward environmental accountability. We are talking about billions of dollars, yet many argue that companies are not being generous enough. Others, including me, believe that it isn’t a lack of funds that’s hindering the broader impact of CSR, but how and where this budget is deployed.

This belief stems from my hands-on involvement in many sustainability initiatives, including in regions that face challenges around localized food production due to degraded soil or water scarcity. The pandemic aggravated the threats to such regions further due to supply-chain disruptions. But even nations with arable land need to consider strategies that support traditional agriculture and increase food production, with minimal labor and resource inputs.

Implementing such innovative food production techniques will require multistakeholder action, from top-down government projects and CSR initiatives to bottom-up efforts from individuals. This begs the question: How can CSR initiatives create a constructive impact in terms of food security?

Aligning With Food-Related SDGs

CSR initiatives are often tied to the United Nations’ 17 sustainable development goals. Although many companies tend to align with SDGs that correspond to local challenges, I’ve noticed that CSR action on food scarcity has been largely restricted to the conventional approach. This boils down to a powerful narrative that links food security to traditional, resource-intensive agriculture. But food security is a multidimensional idea — which includes out-of-the-box techniques such as aeroponics and permaculture.4

As part of CSR goals, companies can promote the planting of trees around office compounds and the creation of backyard gardens with fruits and vegetables. This, in turn, serves as social proof and encourages employees to implement such programs in their homes at a micro level. I’ve seen this happen myself in CSR initiatives I’ve been involved in. The central idea is to drive synergetic farming systems based on crop diversity, natural productivity and sustainability at scale. And water and resource-wise, food security may be best achieved using the food forests model.

Why Food Forests?

As the name suggests, food forests are human-made jungles that are created with an emphasis on edible produce. As ancient societies moved through forests, they identified edible and medicinal plants. This prompted them to encourage the growth of such desirable plants and inhibit the growth of competing vegetation. I believe the time has come to find the middle ground between nature and such human intervention.

Over time, the underlying essence of food forests has remained the same: a layer system including canopy trees, smaller trees, a shrub layer, an herbaceous layer, ground cover crops, a vertical layer made up of vines and a root layer. Within these layers grow fruits, nuts, medicinal plants, perennial vegetables, etc. — all things that are useful to humans in one way or the other. Food forests are productive, low-maintenance and relatively self-sustaining, without requiring chemical intervention and excessive inputs. The soil is naturally enriched with organic matter as leaves fall and decompose. Such self-reliance leads to food forests that mimic symbiotic woodland ecosystems.

As these forests grow, they house various insects and animals, which contribute to composting and pest control. Incrementally, the food yield can increase, while the need for external intervention reduces. Food forests, therefore, can help transform sustainable food security, as opposed to unbalanced monoculture, where relentless deforestation, irrigation and chemical input lead to erosion, soil salinization and finally, agricultural distress.

Integration Of Food Forests With CSR Strategies

Food forests require a long-term vision and unwavering commitment, which I think CSR initiatives can implement easily.

Businesses can create a blueprint detailing the stages of investment, expected results and service providers. If you are in it for the long haul, the achievable outcomes are as advertised. In one such success story in Duncan, British Columbia, the Cowichan Green Community Food Forest is now a source of herbs such as rosemary, vegetables like asparagus and fruits such as salmonberries, figs, grapes, kiwis and plums — all in a single acre, for free community use. Such community-level sustainability, in terms of food, has several implications that align well with diverse SDGs.

Food forests can directly address hunger (SDG-2), health and well-being (SDG-3), responsible consumption and production (SDG-12) and life on land (SDG-15). And unlike other run-of-the-mill CSR programs, food forests will stand as timeless reminders of tangible outcomes and as gifts that keep on giving. And the best part: Once they’re up and running, they don’t require much human intervention. That’s the inherent strength of a forest — it grows abundantly, creating rich biodiversity in the entire space available.

Forests are home to many of the world’s plants and animals, so their regeneration represents the creation of life itself. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the global primary forest area has decreased by over 80 million hectares since 1990. The Covid-19 pandemic put nearly twice as many people around the globe at risk of going hungry. In my view, such intricate dynamics demand increased CSR participation. And food forests are perhaps the best place to start for enduring and sustainable impact.

Article Credit: forbes