Hello, it's Sophie from Oé!
For quite some time now, we have understood that we need to cooperate to address major environmental and climate challenges. That's why we share everything we do openly ( our LCA here , our training for our partner winegrowers here , etc.). That's also why we involve companies, whether or not they are Oé customers, in contributing alongside us to regenerating ecosystems.
Why finance biodiversity restoration?
Let's start at the beginning.
Today, biodiversity is experiencing a rapid and massive collapse: wild populations have fallen by 73% in 50 years ( WWF ). This crisis – the 6th mass extinction – has a direct impact on ecosystems, the services that biodiversity provides us for free, and our economy!
50% of the world's GDP is dependent on nature ( source: World Bank ), more precisely on the services it provides us: pollination, air regulation, carbon storage, and even our own rejuvenation and inspiration during walks in the open air, for example. Financing actions to preserve and restore biodiversity is therefore in good business (and good health 😉) interest.
Many companies are making carbon contributions alongside their efforts to reduce their emissions. This is a good thing; we must do both. Especially since carbon projects increasingly integrate biodiversity co-benefits, which means that beyond carbon sequestration, the project aims to preserve biodiversity. But financing carbon sequestration does not mean preserving biodiversity (it can even work against it), while contributing to restoring biodiversity allows for more carbon to be stored in the soil. Planting hedges, introducing cover crops, and diversifying crops are all actions that promote biodiversity and carbon storage, and make ecosystems more resilient.
Our first collaboration with Agoterra and Bertrand Hospitality in the service of biodiversity
To make a greater contribution to restoring biodiversity, we decided to acquire our first estate, Domaine Oé de la Chapelle Saint-Pierre, located in the Rhône Valley. The goal is to experiment and better support our partner winegrowers.
The EcoFarms diagnosis and soil analysis allowed us to draw up the transition plan for the estate for the next 5 years , with the objective of restoring the very poor biodiversity on the estate (the EcoFarms audit gives a score of 20 out of 100 on this subject...!).
Concretely, here are the main actions we are taking:
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Supply of compost (partnership with Les Alchimistes)
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Elemental sulfur supply
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Sowing cover crops
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Planting hedges and trees (with the French Agroforestry Association)
And on the financing side, beyond more traditional public aid, committed companies are financing these ecosystem regeneration actions through the Agoterra platform . This is the case of our client, Bertrand Hospitality, which has earmarked a biodiversity contribution budget for the next 3 years, and demonstrates this commitment by serving our wines in its restaurants.
We'll let you discover all of this in the replay of the Agoterra x Bertrand Hospitality x Oé webinar
And on Instagram right there !
What's next?
Biodiversity certificates are currently being developed in France, with initiatives aimed at structuring a voluntary market to finance actions in favor of biodiversity. Beyond the methodological difficulties (there is no single indicator for biodiversity, nor any equivalence: while a ton of CO2 in France is the same as in China, biodiversity varies greatly from one territory to another), these initiatives are also working to propose safeguards to avoid the excesses of the carbon market (greenwashing, perverse effects, lack of additionality, etc.).
At Oé, we are following this with great interest to go further, and above all to give you the keys to not being fooled ;)
If you are interested in the process, let’s talk about it !
See you soon,
Sophie
