Pasture restoration and supply chain decarbonisation: the role of insetting in the Caminho Verde Brasil Programme

The Brazilian Roundtable on Sustainable Livestock (MBPS) has published a set of recommendations for the Caminho Verde Brasil Programme, reinforcing the urgency of linking productive land restoration to corporate and national climate targets. Prepared by the MBPS Land Working Group, the document acknowledges important advances in the programme’s design, such as its commitment to deforestation-free production and alignment with Brazil’s NDC, while also highlighting operational gaps that need to be addressed if the programme is to achieve scale. Among the priority recommendations is the creation of a producer–buyer collaboration pathway based on insetting (Scope 3), enabling major buyers to co-finance pasture restoration and recognise soil carbon removals within their greenhouse gas reduction inventories and corporate targets.

Proforest contributed technical input to this discussion, particularly regarding the role of insetting as a decarbonisation tool in agricultural supply chains. The concept of insetting refers to actions undertaken within a company’s own supply chain that generate emissions reductions and carbon sequestration, differing from offsetting precisely because it maintains a direct link with the production chain.

In the Brazilian context, where agriculture and livestock account for 29% of the country’s gross emissions, enabling this mechanism is strategic: it connects producers’ environmental performance to the Scope 3 targets of global buyers, opening up new flows of capital to rural areas. Among the main challenges identified in the MBPS document are limitations in technical and logistical capacity, as well as difficulties in recognising soil carbon removals within corporate inventories. These gaps, while highlighting the need for collaboration, may also hinder private co-financing.

Caminho Verde Brasil represents a concrete opportunity to align pasture restoration with the decarbonisation of supply chains. For this to materialise, carbon instruments, including insetting, must be integrated into public policy. This alignment is not only technical, but could determine whether Brazil succeeds in mobilising the private climate finance the sector needs to advance at scale.

Paulien Denis, Deputy Director of Climate, Proforest

This debate forms part of a broader agenda that Proforest has been developing around decarbonisation as a driver of collaboration across Brazil’s agricultural and forestry supply chains.