Sustainable Soy Progress Report 2024
The Lakes Free Range Egg Company (The Lakes) are proud signatories of The UK Soy Manifesto. This means we have committed to achieving 100% deforestation and conversion-free* (DCF) soy within our supply chain by the end of 2025 (based on a cut-off date of 2020). Our commitment is further outlined in our Sustainable Soy Sourcing Policy
As part of this commitment, we will now annually report our progress for The Lakes as a whole operation. All of the soy in our supply chain is embedded in poultry feed that is consumed at farm-level and therefore all of The Lakes soy usage is indirect.
In 2023 our upstream supply chain utilised an approximate total of 4,128 tonnes of soy embedded within laying poultry feed. The origin of this soy varied between United States, Canada, Brazil, Argentina, with a small amount from other origins. Our organic soy was sourced from China. All of our soy usage was covered by one of the following certifications: CRS, RTRS, FEFAC, or was from an area of low risk origin. Areas of low-risk origin include Canada and North America.
Although this is our first year reporting this data, our consumption has been reduced from previous years as The Lakes have worked directly with a feed supplier, who supplies the majority of our producer farms, to reduce the content of soy within our poultry rations by 58% over the last 5 years.
Within the next year we plan to have 100% EU DR compliant soy within our supply chain which will ensure our soy usage is free from both illegal and legal deforestation and illegal land conversion. We also aim to reduce our soy consumption further by altering our poultry diets where possible. Finally, we will endeavour to source sustainable soy in a segregated supply.
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* Including both legal and illegal deforestation and land conversion. Our definitions are aligned with the Accountability Framework Initiative which can be found here: https://accountability-framework.org/issues/deforestation-and-conversion/