A new study has shown how cultivating soybean and palm oil under agroforestry systems in Brazil has huge environmental value and provides diversified income to farmers.

Black Sea Grain reports on how consulting firm Trucost compared the environmental impact of monoculture production with that of agroforestry.

For palm oil, they found the environmental value of agroforestry was 3 times higher than monoculture per hectare. For soybeans, the environmental value of integrating crops with indigenous forest vegetation was 11 percent higher than for a monoculture approach.

The researchers found that cultivating a mix of 80 percent soybean with 20 percent indigenous forest benefited the ecosystem in terms of health and climate regulation.

Growing palm oil under agroforestry systems with cocoa, passion fruit, pepper, banana, cassava, acai and other species helped to diversify farmer income.

The data used in the analysis was provided by Monsanto (soybean) and Natura Cosmetics (palm oil).

“Companies such as Monsanto and Natura should pull these findings into traditional cost analysis systems to more closely examine other factors, such as yields for each method and where agroforestry methods might be scaled most effectively,” says Richard Mattison, CEO of Trucost.

The study outlines how companies can use such valuation to better communicate the environmental and social benefits of voluntary corporate responsibility programmes to enhance the reputations of their brands.

Read the full story: Monsanto, Natura taste the true cost of palm oil and soybeans