Nestlé and BirdLife will assess regenerative farming’s biodiversity impacts Project measures wildlife outcomes across European agricultural landscapes European farmland bird populations declined 58% between 1980-2024 Birds provide trusted indicators of wider ecosystem health changes Findings could reshape regenerative agriculture and sustainable sourcing strategies Nestlé’s making moves beyond traditional regenerative agriculture, with its latest collaboration. The world’s biggest CPG has teamed up with BirdLife Europe to better understand how regenerative practices can support biodiversity. Nestlé and BirdLife join forces The three-and-a-half-year project will measure the impact of selected regenerative practices on biodiversity across agricultural landscapes and supply chains, assessing whether they deliver meaningful benefits to wildlife and identifying how they can be strengthened. And this matters because, as Nestlé and BirdLife say, Europe’s fields have “grown quieter”. In fact, the Pan-European Common Bird Monitoring Scheme found that European farmland bird populations declined by 58% between 1980 and 2024, with agricultural intensification cited as the primary reason for this. “Current intensive farming is wiping out biodiversity, depleting soils and rapidly increasing farmers’ vulnerability to climate change,” says Ariel Brunner, director of BirdLife Europe and Central Asia. “A profound transformation is urgently needed, and fortunately, many farmers are already experimenting with new approaches...

Agrifood has long debated who should pay for farmers to switch to regenerative agriculture practices. Royal Canin and Roquette now offer a new approach that takes the financial weight away from farmers and spreads it along the supply chain. Ingredients supplier Roquette provides Mars-owned Royal Canin with wheat for its pet food products. Via a partnership with Soil Capital, the two companies will now co-invest in the farms from which they source that wheat. The transition to on-farm regenerative practices typically needs upfront capital to finance things like new equipment, cover crops, and adapting to new crop rotations. Currently, farmers either bear this cost themselves or are part of a corporate insetting program that may or may not offer economical support. “We believe that a joint investment model is the most effective way to drive large-scale adoption of regenerative agriculture,” Magali Amouroux, sustainability manager at Roquette, tells AgFunderNews. “By sharing both the costs and the value created across the supply chain, this approach helps reduce the financial burden on farmers, aligns incentives among stakeholders and ensures a fair distribution of benefits.” Bridge over different methodologies Soil Capital helps companies monitor, measure and report on regenerative agriculture outcomes in addition to...

“We are pleased to see the adoption of regenerative agriculture programs,” said Cailin Vixie, As You Sow’s Senior Environmental Health Coordinator “However, companies making regenerative claims without measuring and reporting progress may fail to achieve expected outcomes and be exposed to claims of greenwashing. Measurement and verification of regenerative practices and outcomes remains an industry-wide weakness.” McCain Foods earned the highest score with 34 points, followed by PepsiCo at 32, Nestlé at 29, and Danone at 26. Danone achieved the largest score improvement, moving from a D to a B. Conagra is the only company on the scorecard to move in the opposite direction; its score fell from 18 to 11 points. Since the 2025 report, the company eliminated pesticide disclosures and stopped reporting several metrics previously used to assess regenerative agriculture outcomes. The full 2026 From the Ground Up report and scorecard, including company-by-company rankings and detailed methodology, is available here. From the Report – Background The first edition of From the Ground Up was published in 2025, benchmarking 20 major food manufacturers and suppliers on their regenerative agriculture programs, policies, and goals. The report provided criteria for investors to assess company performance, risk, and long-term value associated with...

The London initiative seeks to define regenerative wine standards, giving growers clearer demand signals before targets take effect in 2027

When Julaine and Johannes Treur bought their Agassiz farm 15 years ago, it was rare to see an earthworm. More than a decade in corn and Brussels sprouts production had left their fields depleted and dependent on chemical fertilizers and pesticides. THIS CONTENT IS RESERVED FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLY Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada. Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account. Get exclusive access to the Vancouver Sun ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on. Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists. Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists. Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword. SUBSCRIBE TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLES Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada. Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account. Get exclusive access to the Vancouver Sun ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on. Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists. Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists. Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword. REGISTER...

Nestlé and BirdLife Europe today announced a three-and-a-half-year collaboration to measure the impact of selected regenerative agriculture practices on biodiversity across European agricultural landscapes and supply chains. The research will assess whether these practices measurably benefit the wildlife that depends on farmland and will help identify where farming approaches can be strengthened. The question matters because Europe’s fields have grown quieter. According to the PanEuropean Common Bird Monitoring Scheme, European farmland bird populations have declined by 58% between 1980 to 2024. Agricultural intensification is the main factor associated with this decline. For Nestlé, regenerative agriculture is a means to support resilient food systems by aiming to conserve and restore soil, water and biodiversity, capture carbon and support farmers’ livelihoods. This is a science-based programme, and understanding how this farming transition can help restore natural resources is key to supporting agricultural supply-chain resilience and the long-term availability of key ingredients. For BirdLife, birds are a trusted gauge of environmental health, and a way to measure in the real world how regenerative practices deliver for ecosystems. The science sits at the heart of the collaboration. On participating farms, BirdLife’s national partners will monitor birds, butterflies and wild bees using established survey methods...

Can we convince farmers to take climate change seriously while also helping them survive?

Among other outcomes, the researchers report in the study that the most advanced regenerative farms stored nearly 40 percent more carbon in their soils compared to the conventional farm controls. If all field crop farms converted to these systems, Lundgren concluded, cropland soils in the U.S. could hold carbon equivalent to 1.5 years of the country’s annual greenhouse gas emissions. “Life on farms is the answer to the climate crisis,” Lundgren said at the Food Solutions Summit during Climate Week in New York City in September. Civil Eats sat down with Lundgren and asked him about the findings and what they mean for the future of farming on a warming planet. How are you finding and selecting the farms you’re focusing on? It started out with an email campaign, and when we entered an area, we would develop relationships with a few farmers. By the time we would leave a particular area, farmers were usually lining up to join the study. The farmers were really engaged in the actual sample process, they were meeting the scientists, and it was just kind of this cool, uplifting event. Now farmer groups around the country have become self-organized, and they’re approaching us, like,...

Food Forest Podcast · Episode

Apply to the MENA Regenerative Agriculture Venture Programme 2026/27 by 15 November 2026. Researchers and student innovators can win $20,000 grants.

The London initiative seeks to define regenerative wine standards, giving growers clearer demand signals before targets take effect in 2027

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