Valuing Metrics: Advancing Common Metrics for TCA Investments

Lead Organization:

Sustainable Food Alliance, Inc.

Partner Organizations:

The GFM framework has been developed through a 150-member-strong coalition representing the entire food system; TCA Accelerator; Regen10; Sustainable Markets Initiative; among others.

Community of Practice:

Andes

Countries:

Bolivia

Duration:

3/2025—3/2026

Overview:

Alongside the growing realisation that our current food and farming systems are causing potentially irreparable damage to climate, nature and health, there is recognition that, by shifting to systems that work in harmony with nature, agriculture has the potential to become part of the solution. Despite this, the transition is being held back by several barriers to change, including:

  • The lack of an enabling financial environment for farmers wishing to transition – data has indicated that non-intensive farms of all sizes are struggling to survive. Why is this the case? Because of the lack of ‘true cost accounting’ means that industrial farming is between 4-11 times cheaper than regenerative.  The negative environmental and health impacts that result from intensive systems are not paid for at source, instead they are picked up elsewhere in the system, by taxpayers in the form of water bills or by health services in the form of treatment costs for diet-related ill health. On the other hand, farmers who are delivering genuine societal good, such as improving soil health or building biodiversity, are not financially rewarded for these public benefits. 
  • The lack of a common, holistic, framework for measuring farm-level sustainability A truly sustainable farming system (environmental, social and economic) will have a positive impact on the planet. In order to thrive in the long term our farm systems rely on all the environmental services the planet has to offer and therefore by definition to be sustainable it must support these systems. However, the great majority of sustainability assessment tools, certification schemes and corporate reporting frameworks look at only a narrow spectrum of impacts, such as carbon or biodiversity, and ignore the interconnectedness of the whole farming system. These siloed approaches can result in missing the unintended consequences caused by single focus assessment.  This approach also adds significant time and bureaucracy burden on farmers, requiring them to supply similar information in different ways, almost all of which fail to help them understand how they can incrementally improve their sustainability across the whole farming system. When we started developing the Global Farm Metric (GFM) in 2016, collecting farm-level data and monitoring the outcomes of farming systems was not considered a priority. Today, in large part thanks to our advocacy, the need for data is raised in almost every discussion around how to transition to regenerative agriculture. As a result, the GFM has been referenced in the UK National Food Strategy and WWF’s harmonsied metrics report, as well as being an important contributor to the Sustainable Markets Initiative and Regen10. The COP28 announcement that food and farming will be included in National Declared Commitments (NDCs) to reduce climate impact, alongside new corporate reporting frameworks such as TNDF, makes the need for granular data collected at farm level ever more vital.

Outputs and Outcomes:

Outcome 1: 

Regenerative farming represents the most resilient long-term business case for producing food. All stakeholders work together in a series of geographies to enable the transition to regenerative systems. To achieve this we need to work alongside partners, to design and test a new financing framework / blueprint, underpinned by the common sustainability framework, which demonstrates how farmers could be incentivised to transition to practices that contribute to nature restoration, climate change mitigation and social equity. 

Outputs relating to outcome 1: 

  • Financing framework co-developed and published alongside the SMI Agribusiness Hub. This will include recognition that all stakeholders, food companies, retailers, banks, investors, utility providers and government must play a role in developing complementary financing mechanisms which reward measurable sustainable outcomes on farms.
  • 5 companies use the new financing framework to incentivise regenerative outcomes, with a view to building on this in year 2 of the pilot.
  • Report detailing the progress made in the pilot, including a review how far the financing mechanisms went to improve the business case for farmers wishing to transition. This report will also include an analysis of the measurable outcomes observed.

Outcome 2: 

Farmers are appropriately rewarded for the true cost of producing food, based on evidence of the wider environmental, health and societal benefits they contribute. To achieve this we will:

  • Investigate the relationship between the GFM, LCA and TCA and how they support and interact with one another and how this could evolve an application at farm scale.
  • Using GFM as the basis, utilise true cost accounting (TCA) methodologies to value the positive and negative impacts of different farming systems. 
  • We plan to begin this process using individual farms as case studies and then look at the opportunity to scale this model.
  • Develop recommendations for governments to incorporate the impact of true cost into their financing the transition strategy.

Outputs relating to outcome 2:

  • Establishment of a clear narrative and methodology for how TCA can be applied in a farm context.
  • Briefings for policy makers on the use of true cost to incentivise farm sustainability and the financial and policy mechanisms needed to enable this. 

Outcome 3: 

Widespread International use of a holistic approach for understanding and monitoring farm-level sustainability, evidenced by uptake from large coalitions, including the SMI and Regen10 and their members. To achieve this we will:

  • Work with partners in Europe, Australia and the USA to use the GFM framework. Data collection partners (SAX, LEAF, SAI) are using the GFM framework to support the transition to more sustainable farm systems and underpin the monitoring of regenerative farming outcomes.
  • Continue to refine the framework through farmer, academic and wider stakeholder engagement.

Outputs relating to outcome 3:

  • Continuation of the development of the framework for regenerative outcomes with WBSD, Regen10, FOLU and IUCN.
  • Publish a peer reviewed article on the development of the GFM Framework.
  • Release a report on our international trials. Publish GFM 2.0