The Canadian Produce Marketing Association (CPMA) has released a pivotal new report, "Making Our Own Playbook: An Industry-Led Response to the Challenge of Sustainability Reporting and Audit Proliferation". The report, which synthesizes findings from an industry workshop held in Montreal on April 8, 2025, confronts the growing challenge of "audit fatigue" and proposes a unified, industry-led framework to bring clarity, consistency, and value to sustainability assurance in the fresh produce sector.
The report identifies a critical issue termed the "Assurance Paradox": a state where escalating demands for sustainability verification from buyers, regulators, and stakeholders lead to a proliferation of audits and questionnaires. This systemic pressure consumes industry resources with the complex demands of reporting, distracting from the implementation of genuine environmental improvements. The result is a system where more auditing activity does not lead to better assurance and can degrade trust.
In response, the workshop findings propose the development of an Environmental Charter, a pre-competitive sustainability assurance framework built on several key principles. The Charter advocates for a metrics-first, not practices-first approach, shifting the focus to quantifiable, outcomes-based data that is valuable for both producers and buyers.