Target 15.b: Finance for sustainable forest management
Mobilize significant resources from all sources and at all levels to finance sustainable forest management and provide adequate incentives to developing countries to advance such management, including for conservation and reforestation
Owners voting their values help. Others must carry most of it.
Why shareholder democracy is helpful
Forest finance and developing-country incentives are primarily public, flowing through REDD+ and multilateral funds. Private lenders and buyers still set much of the incentive structure. Global Canopy's 2026 Forest 500 finds 59 percent of the 150 assessed financial institutions still lack a deforestation policy. Twenty-three have never published one since assessments began in 2014. Shareholder pressure on traders shows owners can align private capital with sustainable forest management. Support reached 98 percent at Bunge in 2021, followed by commitments on monitoring and supplier traceability. The lever is supportive rather than decisive. Owners help at the margin.
How this was scoredHelpful
Helpful. Owners voting their values help. Others must carry most of it.
We have not yet written down the two answers behind this rating. Recording them on every item, so a reader can check the reasoning and not only the conclusion, is work in progress.
Every rating is the higher of two answers, one for what companies do and one for what they spend to stop the outcome, because the same vote reaches both. See the full method.
Sources
What civil society organizations are helping owners on this
Engages consumer-facing companies through sign-on letters and shareholder proposals to adopt forest protection policies, naming Costco, Kraft Heinz and J.M. Smucker among companies that did so.
3 campaigns on record
Assess and report on supplier compliance with law and company standards in the avocado supply chain, where clearing for orchards is illegal.
Result: not stated in source
Adopt forest protection policies covering Brazilian forests threatened by soy and cattle production.
Result: not stated in source
Green Century states the engagements led the companies to implement forest protection policies.
Adopt best practice certification for directly managed forests and supply chains, use selective logging or continuous cover forestry in natural forest areas, increase tree species diversity and retain dead wood in clear-cut areas.
With Evli PLC, KLP Asset Management
Result: not stated in source
The investors report regular dialogues and site visits, and flag that some Swedish companies are increasing logging volumes at the expense of sustainability standards.
How this rating was made
Every item on every one of our maps is read against one question: how far does this depend on the people who own companies voting their values? We answer it twice, once for what companies do and once for what they spend to stop the outcome, and take whichever answer is higher, since the same vote reaches both. The score carries its reasoning and its sources so that a reader can check it rather than take it.
- Pivotal. Owners voting their values can deliver most of the outcome.
- Necessary. Owners remove an obstacle nothing else removes, and others must also act.
- Helpful. Owners voting their values help, and others carry most of it.
- Independent. This moves without owners. Other levers carry it.
The advocacy record on this page holds only what a source we opened says happened. Where we searched and found nothing, the page says so rather than leaving a silence. Where a campaign names a filer the source does not name, it says that too. Ratings are ours; the list of subjects is UN Sustainable Development Goals's, and we link to their original.
How we score dependency, in full.