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Highlights The links between transparency and sustainabilityare poorly understood. We present a typology of information for supply chain governance. The coverage of existing transparencyinitiatives is limited and biased in scope. We present ten ways in which transparency can improve sustainability governance.

While many developed countries are increasing their forest cover, deforestation is still rife in the tropics and subtropics. With international trade in forest-risk commodities on the rise, it is becoming increasingly important to consider between-country trade linkages in assessing the drivers of-and possible connections between-forest loss and gain across countries. Previous studies have shown that countries that have undergone a forest transition (and are now increasing their forest cover) tend to displace land use outside their borders. However, lack of comprehensive data on deforestation drivers imply that it has not been possible to ascertain whether this has accelerated forest loss in sourcing countries. To remedy this, we present a land-balance model that quantifies deforestation embodied in production of agricultural and forestry commodities at country level across the tropics and subtropics, subsequently tracing embodied deforestation to countries of apparent consumption using a physical, country-to-country trade model. We find that in the period 2005-2013, 62% (5.5 Mha yr −1 ) of forest loss could be attributed to expanding commercial cropland, pastures and tree plantations. The commodity groups most commonly associated with deforestation were cattle meat, forestry products, oil palm, cereals and soybeans, though variation between countries and regions was large. A large (26%) and slightly increasing share of deforestation was attributed to international demand, the bulk of which (87%) was exported to countries that either exhibit decreasing deforestation rates or increasing forest cover (lateor post-forest transition countries), particularly in Europe and Asia (China, India, and Russia). About a third of the net forest gains in postforest transition countries was in this way offset by imports of commodities causing deforestation elsewhere, suggesting that achieving a global forest transition will be substantially more challenging than achieving national or regional ones.

Significance The Brazilian Amazon is at a critical juncture after the recent stabilization of deforestation rates. Identifying opportunities for continued deforestation reductions requires an understanding of the contribution of different actors to overall deforestation. We provide the first such assessment, to our knowledge, that reports on two headline findings. First, between 2004 and 2011, areas dominated by properties larger than 500 ha accounted for 48% of the deforestation compared with only 12% for smallholders (<100 ha). Second, the deforestation share attributed to the largest properties (≥2,500 ha) declined by 63% from a peak in 2005, whereas that of smallholders increased by 69%. Further reductions in deforestation are likely to require a shift toward more incentive-based policies that are tailored toward different actors.

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Consumption of globally traded agricultural commodities like soy and palm oil is one of the primary causes of deforestation and biodiversity loss in some of the world’s most species-rich ecosystems. However, the complexity of global supply chains has confounded efforts to reduce impacts. Companies and governments with sustainability commitments struggle to understand their own sourcing patterns, while the activities of more unscrupulous actors are conveniently masked by the opacity of global trade. We combine state-of-the-art material flow, economic trade, and biodiversity impact models to produce an innovative approach for understanding the impacts of trade on biodiversity loss and the roles of remote markets and actors. We do this for the production of soy in the Brazilian Cerrado, home to more than 5% of the world´s species. Distinct sourcing patterns of consumer countries and trading companies result in substantially different impacts on endemic species. Connections between individual buyers and specific hot spots explain the disproportionate impacts of some actors on endemic species and individual threatened species, such as the particular impact of European Union consumers on the recent habitat losses for the iconic giant anteater (Myrmecophaga tridactyla). In making these linkages explicit, our approach enables commodity buyers and investors to target their efforts much more closely to improve the sustainability of their supply chains in their sourcing regions while also transforming our ability to monitor the impact of such commitments over time.

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