What happens when one ESG priority comes into conflict with another? This week we examine a chart from the World Resources Institute (www.wri.org) of data from the Servicio de Información Agroalimentaria y Pesquera chronicling a decade of growth in avocado production in Mexico. Avocados play on ESG themes of healthy eating, job creation and economic opportunity. Unfortunately, the explosion of consumption, primarily in the US as a result of NAFTA, of Mexican avocados has fueled deforestation, draining of aquifers, soil degradation, increased CO2 emissions, threatens indigenous species and even triggers small earthquakes. According to various studies assembled by the World Economic Forum, avocado groves consume multiples of the water of indigenous forest, and the fruit has an end-point carbon emissions footprint many times that of bananas. As with other monocultures like palm in Indonesia, avocado has brought economic opportunity to areas that badly need it like Michoacán province, but at a profound and unsustainable cost. Conscientious consumption and deploying capital to find more sustainable methods of cultivation without depriving Michoacán of needed money and opportunity are examples of where ESG is headed to address whole-systems challenges rather than focusing narrowly on single issues or ideas.
