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For decades, huge swaths of Brazils Cerrado ecosystem have been used to support the global demand for burgers. Forests and grasslands were replaced by pastures along with farms growing soy to feed cattle. But a major restoration project is now underway on an area nearly twice as large as Manhattan. If you fly over one part of southwestern Brazil, youll see a patchwork of dozens of square plots where a local university is studying different methods of helping native plants regrow on former cattle pastures. On more than 25,000 acres, along rivers and the edge of remaining pieces of forest, new vegetation has been growing quickly over the past two years. Wildlife cameras track the native species that are returning, from puma to an endangered species of rabbit. The environmental group Conservation International is working on the project with an unlikely set of partners: a forestry company and the tech giant Apple. [Photo: TIG] Why Apple is investing in forests The project is one piece of Apples climate strategy. When we look at the global climate science, its clear that we have to cut emissions as quickly as possible, but we also have to end deforestation and rapidly scale up carbon removal in order to stay within 1.5 degrees [of global temperature rise], says Chris Busch, director of environmental initiatives at Apple. The companys first priority is reducing its own emissions. Through tactics like using recycled rare earth elements in iPhones and helping suppliers shift to renewable energy at factories, it has already cut its emissions by 60% compared to 2015. By 2030, its aiming to hit 75%. But for the remaining 25%, Busch says, We just don’t have a clear line of sight to how to avoid those emissions at scale today within our value chain. So that is where nature comes in to play a role for us. There are several ways to take CO2 out of the atmosphere, including nascent technology like direct air capture. But Apple knew that in order to reach its short-term goals for 2030, it would need to lean on natures ability to capture carbon because no other approach was ready to scale up quickly enough. At the same time, the company recognized that there werent enough nature-based carbon credits available to buyand restoration and preservation projects often struggle to prove that they actually have as much benefit as they claim. In 2021, Apple committed $200 million to the Restore Fund, a new fund established with Conservational International and Goldman Sachs, to help carbon removal grow more quickly and to focus on creating quality projects. (In 2023, it pledged an additional $200 million for a second fund within the program.) One of the first investments, in 2022, was Project Alpha in Brazil. Restoration and planting started in 2023. It’s the first step in a larger effort that will eventually restore 741,000 acres of degraded land across Brazil, Uruguay, and Chile. A biodiversity hot spot The Cerrado ecosystem, which originally sprawled over more than a million square miles in Brazil with a mix of dense forests, grasslands, and wetlands, is a biodiversity hot spot. Many of its 1,600-plus species of animals, and 10,000 species of plants, can’t be found anywhere else. It’s also quickly disappearing. “It’s faced a rate of loss that’s fairly extreme,” says Will Turner, senior vice president at Conservation International’s Center for Natural Climate Solutions. “Well over half of the native Cerrado vegetation has been destroyed, predominantly due to agriculture.” The restoration project is focusing on an area that was converted for grazing in the 1990s, and bought the land from cattle farmers. As grasslands were replaced by pasture, they were planted with invasive grasses to feed cattle. The grass chokes off the growth of native plants. Because it’s spread so much, the non-native grass makes restoration expensive and challenging. That’s why the project took a new approach: Instead of focusing solely on restoration, it’s happening in combination with carefully managed forestry. [Photo: TIG] Why an environmental group wanted to partner with a forestry company BTG Pactual Timberland Investment Group (TIG), the forestry partner on the project, is planting tree farms on half of the former grazing land, and managing restoration on the other half. In some ways, the solution seems counterintuitive: The tree farms will grow eucalyptus, a non-native species from Australia. In other parts of Brazil, environmental groups have derided eucalyptus plantations, arguing that they’re destructive. But the trees can thrive in degraded soil where other species struggle to grow. They also grow quickly, taking up large amounts of CO2. Since deforestation reduces rainfall, planting new trees can also help with the hydrological cycle. And as global demand for wood continues to grow, the new plantationswhich are FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) certifiedcan potentially help avoid deforestation of native trees in places like the Amazon rainforest. Some critics argue that eucalyptus overuses groundwater, but Conservation International says that’s often caused by poor management. If a eucalyptus plantation is managed well, the nonprofit says, recent research suggests it will use the same amount of water as a native forest. (The forestry company is also screening out locations that have insufficient water availability and monitoring water security for others in the area.) When TIG bought grazig land from farmers, it carefully tracked where the cattle were moved, making sure that the process didn’t lead to new land being cleared elsewhere. (The company agreed to this, along with other sustainability critera, as part of the project.) Then, with guidance from Conservation International, it began “assisted natural regeneration,” taking steps to help native vegetation regrow. In some areas, it’s also planting seeds or seedlings. Having the forestry company on the site also means that its crew can protect the restored areas from encroachment from other farmers or fight wildfires if needed. The forestry company will earn carbon credits both as its trees capture CO2 and as native vegetation is being restored. Apple also has a stake in the project. “What we’re aiming to do is generate a financial return as an investor in those projects, but also a carbon return,” says Busch. “Part of the return that we get on that investment is carbon credits.” Third-party auditors will monitor the project before the carbon credits are issued. Apple is also helping with some of the monitoring technology, including testing ways to use the iPhone’s lidar scanner to measure the diameter of trees. Without the forestry part of the project in place, Conservation International says it’s unlikely that any restoration would have happened in the area at all. Including forestry makes the restoration financially viable. And it helped it happen at a large scale: The project will increase the restoration across the entire Cerrado region by 50%. “At the end of the day, what we think is really important is figuring out how to get to scale in terms of restoration and carbon sequestration quickly,” says Apple’s Busch. “That needs to be funded somehow. The conservation side of the operation is truly [financially] sustainable because it can be funded by the business side.”
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E-Commerce
These days, when you head to a shop to buy clothes, most brands package your purchases in a recyclable paper bag, which looks more eco-friendly than plastic. But behind the scenesin back rooms that most customers never seeevery single clothing retailer has enormous piles of flimsy plastic bags (sometimes called poly bags). These bags keep clothes clean as they travel across the complex global supply chain before arriving at the store. We need to keep clothes in good condition as they move from factories to shipping containers to trucks, says Candan Erenguc, chief operations officer at Anthropologie. [Photo: WM/Anthropologie] Most local recycling facilities don’t have the equipment to recycle poly bags, which are more complicated to break down than more solid plastics like water bottles. So most retailers simply send them in the regular waste stream where they will end up in a landfill. Since plastic does not biodegrade, these bags will break down into tiny fragments of microplastic that will end up in our waterways and food. Anthropologie has been on a mission to find a way to recycle the poly bags it collects across its 215 retail stores. Over the past 18 months, it has partnered with Waste Management (WM), the largest recycling company in the United States, to develop a solution. Now, store associates collect these bags and send them to special facilities that are equipped to recycle them into other plastic products, extending their life. Anthropologie has already recycled more than 60,000 tons of poly bags, which have been transformed into pellets that will be used to create other plastic items, including trash bags. It has been a very seamless process, and we want to make sure other retailers know they can do it as well, says Erenguc. That said, things like trash bags cannot be further recycled, so they will eventually end up in a landfill. So it is still incumbent on brands to find ways to reduce the amount of plastic they consume and discard. For decades, flimsy plastic bags have been a challenge for municipal recycling facilities that collect household waste. If you accidentally put them in your curbside recycling bin, they can clog up the recycling equipment, shutting the system down. As a result, people have been encouraged to simply dispose of these bags in the regular waste stream, where they will be landfilled or incinerated. However, recycling technology is quickly improving, according to Tara Hemmer, chief sustainability officer at WM. For one thing, WM is now investing in robotics and computer vision technology that can better catch plastic bags that end up in the waste stream and separate them from the rest of the trash, so they don’t cause a major disturbance. And perhaps more impressively, there are now several industrial recycling facilities across the U.S. that are specifically designed to recycle poly bags. Some of these plants are owned by WM. But there are also independent recyclers that partner with WM. We work with our customers to make sure they can direct their waste to the right facility in our third-party network, says Hemmer. [Photo: WM] Erenguc wanted to find a way to collect poly bags and ship them to these locations. However, as a major retailer, this presented a logistical challenge. It was also important for the process to be easy for employees to understand and follow. Each of Anthropologie’s 215 stores is staffed with dozens of employees who must be trained on best practices when it comes to waste disposal. Moreover, it was unclear where the nearest recycling facility would be for each store. We didn’t want to be transporting poly bags back and forth across the country, because that isn’t good for the environment either, Erenguc says. But this is where WM could help. Anthropologie brought in members of the WM team to study the situation and come up with a solution that would be easy for retail employees to adopt. WM identified the address of the closest recycling facility for each store. Retail associates now collect plastic bags and when they have achieved a certain volume, they ship them out to a designated facility. The recycling plants turn poly bags into pellets that can than be used to create other products. It’s such a streamlined solution, Erenguc says. It was so easy to execute, but we’ve already managed to divert 60,000 pounds of plastic from landfills. [Photo: WM] Hemmer says that many retailers are eager to divert waste from landfill. While there’s been a narrative that companies have abandoned their sustainability goals, that hasn’t been her experience. We’ve found that companies still have goals and are marching towards them, she says. And consumerproduct companies are trying to increase the amount of recycled content that goes into their products. Hemmer says that recycling technology is improving every year. WM is currently working to make it possible to recycle plastic bags in residential areas, beginning with a plant in Chicago that will reach about 3,500 households. But often the obstacle to bringing about change at scale isn’t technologicalit’s logistical. People, as well as companies, are more likely to adopt new processes if they’re simple. Part of our job is to help troubleshoot, says Hemmer. But diverting waste from landfill is actually a lot easier than you’d imagine.
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E-Commerce
Elon Musk’s foray into government has proven disastrous for his business life. Since taking up work for President Donald Trumps’ so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Musk’s electric car company Tesla has seen sales slide and has become a target for protests. Now some believe that damage could be terminal and that Musk poses a risk to companies outside of his own. The Reputation Risk Index looks at reputational threats facing companies and organizations. It recently found that being associated with Musk posed the second biggest threat to companies, between the harmful or deceptive use of artificial intelligence and backtracking on DEI. The index, which is based on a survey with 117 public affairs leaders and former heads of state, found it’s not just being associated with Musk that’s risky, but being singled out and publicly criticized by him. In an aerial view, brand-new Tesla cars and Cybertrucks sit parked in a lot at a Tesla dealership on April 02, 2025, in Corte Madera, California. [Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images] With his controversial omnipresence in the media landscape, 28% of the council identified this association as a top reputational risk, highlighting Musks impact on businesses that extend well past his own, Global Risk Advisory Council chair Isabel Casillas Guzman said in the report. Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives predicted in a note Sunday that even if Musk were to quit DOGE and get back to his car company there will be permanent brand damage.” And if Musk stays in government, brand damage could grow for Tesla, calling it a code red situation for the company. Musk “needs to leave the government, take a major step back on DOGE, and get back to being CEO of Tesla full-time,” Ives wrote. Musk’s hard turn to DOGE has shown that mixing business with politics can backfire, especially for a public CEO of a company that relies on customers who in large part don’t share his views. If Musk wasn’t planning on leaving his post as a special government employee after the 130-day limit comes up, he might find a more persuasive business reason that it’s time to get back to his day job.
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E-Commerce
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