New mapping system ends farm mislabeling, protecting coffee and cacao trade

A new system could overhaul maps that misclassify hundreds of thousands of smallholder coffee and cacao farmers as working in forests. Without better maps, deforestation regulations could ripple through markets from remote farms to a caffe mocha near you.

Sample Earth, launched by the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT, helps mapmakers build accurate, inclusive maps to prevent smallholder farmers from being wrongly classified as producing major commodities in forested areas. Misclassification risks excluding compliant producers from markets enforcing deforestation-free rules, particularly the European Union’s new regulation (EUDR). The initiative is the result of a collaboration between Alliance researchers, tech companies (including Google), and the World Cocoa Foundation. Researchers call on private-sector mapmakers to adopt their model to harden their supply chains against disruption.