COP28: Deforestation Outcomes

A few weeks ago, we did a blog post about the upcoming Conference of the Parties, better known as COP28 (because this is the 28^th one!), if you need a reminder, you can find the blog post here!

We eagerly awaited some positive news to come out of COP28 and on Nature Day it was confirmed that more will be done to protect the world’s forests by making sure that some supermarket essentials have no link to illegal deforestation (about time!!).

Illegal deforestation is a HUGE problem, and for anyone new to this illegal deforestation is when:

• Trees are removed without permission from the landowner.
• Protection laws are broken.
• Failing to complete environmental impact assessments.

Despite forests being regarded as the lungs of we earth, we lose the equivalent of 30 football pitches every minute, destroying the habitats of tigers, jaguars, orangutan, and many other endangered species. As a result, the UK government is set to introduce stricter legislations targeting industries that are heavily linked to deforestation, they have prioritised products that contain things such as palm oil, cocoa, and soy in addition to beef and leather.

Moving forwards, big brands and businesses will be better regulated to make sure they aren’t sourcing any of the ingredients or materials from illegally deforested land, so the consumer can shop with more confidence, to this we say, support the brands that have taken a stance against deforestation from day 1! It is great to see more regulations coming into play, however what this does confirm, is that without these regulations, the big companies wouldn’t care enough to act in the interest of the environment. We are calling for this legislation to extend to more products and categories – in particular toilet paper! Statistics claim that up to 1 million trees are cut down daily around the world to provide tree pulp for tissue paper (and we bet a significant amount of this is done illegally!)

At Cheeky Panda HQ, it saddens us how normalised deforestation has become, and this has been the driving force behind our tree free mission and focus on bamboo. Bamboo not only provides a solution to the deforestation issue but also has a better carbon footprint as it absorbs more carbon than trees and releases less carbon when harvested! Last year we teamed up with WWF to further protect our beautiful world. Tanya Steele, the CEO of WWF had this to say about the outcome of nature day:

‘Nearly eight million hectares of primary forest has been lost globally in the last two years alone, so this is an important first step to getting illegal deforestation off UK shopping shelves. However illegal deforestation is only part of the picture – with wildlife numbers plummeting and wild habitats facing destruction, we must stop felling forests, full stop. Forests absorb 30% of the carbon we emit from burning fossil fuels, so nature is clearly our greatest ally in tackling climate change’.

We stand in agreement with Tanya, that to see real change we must stop cutting down the world forests full stop. Alternative fibres, like bamboo, are the answer to a more sustainable future. We are proud to be partnering with WWF, an organisation whose mission aligns with our own, to conserve our forests, habitats, and animals for generations to come.