Strauss & co - WWF Art Auction

59 Tatjana is aware of targeting stakeholders and addressing specific audiences. Through her research she has identified that ten out of South Africa’s 1 800 food and beverage manufacturers in fact control the supply chain in our country, and she knows that retailers play a big role in influencing consumer behaviour. ‘WWF works where there is the most potential for large-scale change, focusing on making product sustainability a pre-competitive issue. It’s getting harder and harder to be an informed consumer. How do you evaluate your decisions? Is feedlot beef better for the planet than poorly managed range land? Should you be buying local only? These decisions require a lot of information and our work is aimed at helping businesses, and their customers, to make better environmentally informed choices.’ Tatjana strongly believes that the next wave of change will come through effective partnerships and collaboration, andWWF has deep experience of working with corporates and helping these partners respond to environmental challenges. In fact, Tatjana expresses how well positioned corporates are in creating long and lasting change, particularly the big retail players, in terms of how food is produced. To this end, WWF-SA has set up key and close working partnerships with SA’s top retailers Woolworths, Pick n Pay and others. Woolworths has now signed a three-year market transformation commitment to deliver against its targets by 2015. The targets with Pick n Pay are for all seafood sold to be MSC (Marine Stewardship Council) certified by 2016, which means sustainable supply from our living oceans. WWF-SA is a viable convener between two seemingly competitive retailers who share a common vision: to not only succeed in business, but to stay in business in the long term. ‘It’s incredibly encouraging how willing some of those in retail and manufacturing are to shift and adapt their strategies to address issues of resource scarcity and climate change. Whereas WWF-SA has historically been good at the supply side in terms of influencing better water use and reducing chemicals used on farms, as well as conserving wildlife and the environment, it was the demand side where we needed to get stronger so that the market – both retailers and consumers – started to drive the desire for better dairy and beef and all-round improvements in agriculture from an ecosystem and biodiversity perspective. ‘Our world is interconnected in fundamental ways but these connections or the inherent trade-offs are not always apparent. A case in point is the linkages between food, water and energy and how we need to adapt policy and planning to manage these resources. With mega- forces like resource scarcity and climate change fundamentally altering our world, imagine the next 50 years for our children? It’s a battered world that we’ve taken so little care of, a looming crisis that we’ve bequeathed to our kids. We’ve set them this massive task that none of us in our time can handle.’ As a mother herself, Tatjana applies her work mindset at home through not buying more than she and her family can consume, ensuring better meal planning and, by cooking their food themselves, her family members are also able to reduce their waste. She is proud to say that they have an almost zero-waste home. She talks lovingly about picking gooseberries off the bush in her garden, and the delicate operation of peeling off the exterior casing to reveal the plump juicy gooseberry in all its glory. This act of appreciation for how things grow and develop is evident in the passion with which Tatjana speaks about her work withinWWF too. ‘Be more interested in your food and meat sources, be fascinated by where it comes from,’ she says. ‘Try to meet the farmer who nurtured it or perhaps plant some carrots yourself and cherish their shape and flavour when you pull them from the ground.’ Of course it is not as simple as planting food gardens and picking gooseberries, but rather about an awareness that reaches from farm to fork, hook to plate, a seamless connection throughout the value chain which makes it possible to ensure that sustainability is at the core of everything we do.