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How industry body COBEA is strengthening Brazil’s animal welfare
30 Plays5 hours ago
Elisa Tjarnstrom, Executive Director of Brazilian Food Industry Collaboration for Animal Welfare talks to Mark Clements about the work achieved by the food industry body since its creation in 2024
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Transcript
Introduction and Brazil's Role in Poultry
00:00:00
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the Future of Poultry podcast series.
00:00:12
Speaker
Hello, I'm Mark Clements, Editor-in-Chief Poultry with WhatGlobal Media. We all know that Brazil is the world's second largest chicken meat producer and its largest exporter. It also ranks within the top five egg-producing nations with a growing export market.
00:00:27
Speaker
Perhaps less well known is that Brazil has a long history of animal welfare, with some animal rights enshrined within its constitution. Today
Advancing Animal Welfare in Brazil with Elisa Chanström
00:00:36
Speaker
on the Future of Poultry podcast, we're going to look at how animal welfare is taking a further step forward in Brazil.
00:00:43
Speaker
And I'm delighted to welcome Elisa Chanström, CEO of the Brazilian Food Industry Collaboration for Animal Welfare, Copeia, to the podcast. Initially, Copeia comprised eight food companies, both homegrown and subsidiaries of overseas businesses. But with a new major global food concern joining the grouping and the publication of a major positioning document recently taking place, now is the perfect time to take a deeper dive into what Covea is, what it's achieved and what its plans are.
00:01:14
Speaker
Elisa, welcome to the Future of Poultry podcast. Thank you very much. Thank you for having me. Elisa, there's a lot going on with Covea. Tell me about the grouping and how it came into being.
00:01:25
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Sure. So Kobea is a pre-competitive company coalition. It was launched at the end of 2024. So we have a little over a year, one and a half years of operations.
00:01:39
Speaker
And it
History and Legislation of Animal Welfare in Brazil
00:01:40
Speaker
was really an opportunity and a request from major companies within the animal protein value chain here in Brazil to increase collaboration, to be able to come together to facilitate and drive improvements and advancements on animal welfare here in Brazil.
00:02:00
Speaker
Brazil actually has a long history of animal welfare legislation dating back to the mid-1930s and animals have certain rights under the 1988 constitution. does Cabea's work build
Copeia's Mission and Collaborative Approach
00:02:12
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on this? Well, I mean, I think you're right. I think there is basis in the Brazilian legislation going way back. I would say that today the regulatory landscape is a little bit varied. So some species have stronger protection than others.
00:02:27
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But I mean, we're building on a very ah deep tradition of animal agriculture, of producing animal products and Really, it's fascinating to see how this growing interest in animal welfare phrase is just sort of a natural progression on that. So I think we're building on a strong heritage here.
00:02:51
Speaker
Absolutely. So with Cabea, what are its aims exactly? So, like I said, it's really about improving collaboration across the animal protein value chain. So one of our main objectives is to align expectations, set common objectives and ambitions for the future, sort of across all the chains of the value chain. So involving producers and buyers to sort of get everybody working in the same direction.
00:03:22
Speaker
It's also about creating sort of a neutral platform to drive this important issue forward. So Kobea is able to sort of join a lot of different stakeholders who normally don't sit down and speak to each other. So it's also about creating collaborations with other industry organizations, with the NGO community, with the academic community, with the financial sector, Just really being this catalyst and this neutral platform and stakeholder that's able to make the most of all the interest and appetite that's out there and sort of organize that in a really constructive way.
00:04:04
Speaker
And you mentioned that Kobe offers pre-competitive collaboration. Could you explain for us what that means? It's not about business negotiations or anything like that. like We follow very strict antitrust rules.
00:04:20
Speaker
But it's about companies being able to come together because since this is a complex issue that... broadly require systemic changes. It's very limiting. There are limitations to what a single company can achieve. What is needed is that everybody involved does their part and is able to mobilize and agree on what the priorities are so that there is less confusion, less sort of conflicting agendas, less confusion as well in terms of expectations for suppliers. It's about creating that mutual understanding and mutual sense of where we're going and what needs to happen in order for improvements to be made. So what has CABAY achieved since it was formed towards the end of 2024 and what are your aims for this year? As you can imagine, the first six bonds were a lot about setting up the organization and engaging with the first group of interested at companies, setting all those practicalities up. During 2025, we were able to really get into this foundation work because we want this to be something that has real impact. And that's why we started out with setting a foundation for the work in terms of our approach document that really sets out how Kobea views animal welfare. You know, we're referencing the WOA definition. we are referencing the five dominions. We also set out to define what a stepwise process of continuous improvement actually means, because a lot of people talk about the need for continuous improvement, but nobody really talks about what is needed in practice in order for that to happen.
00:06:03
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So
Elisa's Journey and Copeia's Strengthened Focus
00:06:04
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that's something that we built during last year, and it really demonstrates the potential of all of these huge companies being able to come together and agree on those foundational concepts for this work. We also have done a couple of webinars. We've, of course, engaged companies. and presented this initiative to a lot of different organizations. And the last couple of months, we've been working on on a report, an analysis that really looks at how animal welfare has evolved in Brazil, what is currently going well, and sort of where are the key challenges still for each of the five main sectors. So that's what we're working on now. And this report and these findings will be presented at a conference in the beginning of May. Lisa, you have a long history of working with animal welfare across numerous countries. What brought you to Kobea? I've been working as an advisor and a consultant in animal welfare for the private sector since about 2016. scaling it up in 2018. And I was working on some global multi-stakeholder projects. I was also an advisor to the certification scheme, Produtor do Bain, which is a new or the first ever Brazilian animal welfare certification, which was launched a couple of years ago. So I was supporting them. And during one of the first events that we did
00:07:34
Speaker
with this certification, we really saw the potential and the appetite that there were in the animal protein sector here for this kind of collaborative initiative. So it was through ProLotorte Bay and through the network of of that team, of my colleagues in that team, and the potential that we saw of bringing people together in a new way to really tackle this issue immediately.
00:07:59
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in a different way, you know, trying to create a different way of working with this that actually facilitates progress for everybody. I mentioned earlier that Kibbe has a new member and it's a significant player in BRF.
00:08:12
Speaker
What will that company's membership mean for the grouping? I mean, NBRF is a great addition, of course, to the coalition with the recent merger of Marfrig and BRF. You know, they are naturally a huge player, not only in Brazil, but also globally. So they bring a lot of experience and bring a lot of weight to the coalition. They have experience and focus in several key species as well.
00:08:40
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and So I think that they're going to bring more weight, more focus to the coalition, really be able to contribute on the sector-specific working groups that we are developing as well during this year. So the idea is that COBEA not only works strategically with this issue across all species, but that we're also going to go into some more sector-specific project work to really develop solutions where we have identified key barriers.
00:09:07
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And I'm sure
Systemic Challenges and Global Principles in Animal Welfare
00:09:09
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that they're going to be able to play a valuable role in this process. And Cabea focuses on value chain dynamics and on how to engage various players that have an influence over how animal agriculture is shaped. That's correct, no?
00:09:25
Speaker
Yeah, I think it goes back to my previous point about this being a complex issue that really requires systemic changes. So what that means is that several different actors and stakeholders that have a stake in this need to be able to come together. The event that I was mentioning that we're organizing together with Produt Ordebeng at the beginning of May, it really focuses on animal welfare and why it makes business sense. So it's about bringing together, for example, the financial sector, but also public policy, but also academia to really talk about this in a constructive way in terms of what tools are needed, what synergies, what projects, collaborative projects are needed in order for us to move forward with this. So I think it goes back to my previous point about this being a complex issue. It's not something that a single company or even a single company
00:10:22
Speaker
Part of the value chain is able to fix, but it's something that needs all hands on deck, the participation of all these stakeholder groups in order to move forward. You recently published your first positioning document, Cabea's approach to animal welfare, which sets out a common vision, definition and principles to inform the group's work and to guide its collective action. Tell me about that, if you would. Yeah, so as I mentioned, we think it's important to reference these key concepts that are already globally recognized so that we also demonstrate that everything is part of a global movement to improve animal welfare. So that's why we're referencing the lower definition, which is, you know, widely used by several different organizations. We also reference the five dominions model, you know, and the idea that what we need to do is to work continuously to improve and enhance positive impacts for animals while reducing the negative impacts of production as much as possible.
00:11:31
Speaker
So those are some of the foundational concepts that we believe in, that we support, as well as what I talked about, the steps that are needed in order for continuous improvement to happen. So that's really related to governance processes. It's related to having a clear process for supplier engagement. It's about setting indicators in order to evaluate progress.
00:11:57
Speaker
It's about transparency and reporting. So I think it's we've been able to contribute as a first step in that sense that If people can have a more shared view in terms of what animal welfare means and how this needs to be tackled in practice, I think we've already taken an important first step.
00:12:17
Speaker
Now, well, Cabea's membership currently comprises companies working in Brazil. You are happy to interact with organizations outside of the country. Yeah, definitely. I mean, at the moment, we
Invitation for Collaboration and Future Updates
00:12:30
Speaker
have several global companies with operations in ver Brazil participating in the coalition, but we are also a lot about collaborating at a global level. So,
00:12:41
Speaker
across the value chain, but also with organizations in other countries, because we believe that there's a lot of potential in learning from each other. the Although certain conditions of production and production systems may vary, but from our experience, a lot of of the challenges are similar. So we also see this as an opportunity to engage with other organizations and groups interested in driving animal mobile welfare in other regions.
00:13:09
Speaker
So any companies that are operating within Brazil and would like to join the grouping, in the first instance, they should simply go to www.cabea.com.br.
00:13:22
Speaker
That is correct. And interested companies are more than welcome to get in touch. Right now, we are engaging quite a lot with the retail sector. So it's important that we also get more participation from the buyer side. We have quite a lot of producers and some buyers, but we also need more members from the buyer side to really be able to drive this forward.
00:13:46
Speaker
Elisa, thank you ever so much for joining us today. it's been a pleasure to talk to you. Would you come back to the podcast perhaps in a few months and let us know what's been going on with Cabea, update us on its progress? Of course, it would be my pleasure to update you.
00:14:01
Speaker
Listeners, as ever, very many thanks for joining us today. Don't forget to look up for upcoming episodes of the Future of Poultry podcast. Until next time, goodbye.