Through IMPACT Beyond, Sucafina works with roasters and partners to co-create projects designed to deliver measurable, sustainable change within a supply chain. Collecting the high-quality, meaningful data needed to give a clear view of progress is complex and requires months of planning and collaboration. We sat down with Isaac Etungu, Sustainability M&E Specialist (and a key member of our Sustainability Team) in Uganda, to hear more about the work that goes into every IMPACT Beyond Report.
Going Beyond Responsible Sourcing
Sucafina’s IMPACT Program assures long-term sustainable performance along every step of our supply chain. IMPACT Verified provides the foundation, offering responsibly sourced, traceable coffees that align with rigorous socioeconomic and environmental standards. IMPACT Beyond goes further by activating long-term transformation across five goal areas: Living Income, Regenerative Agriculture, Climate Action, Community Wellbeing and Forest Conservation.
Roasters and other partners can work with Sucafina to co-create and co-invest in IMPACT Beyond projects tailored to the needs of a particular supply chain. We use regional data and local expertise to identify opportunities and guide investment along the way.
To monitor progress and better understand where further action may be needed, partners need reliable, data-driven insights. That's where IMPACT Beyond reports come in.
What Goes into an IMPACT Beyond Report?
IMPACT Beyond reports bring together data and insights from a selected supply chain, providing transparency on sustainability performance and progress against the relevant IMPACT Goals.
The final report is the culmination of a process involving multiple teams, disciplines and stages of work. “Every journey begins with a client request for a specific supply chain and one or more IMPACT Goals,” Isaac says.
From there, a typical report takes three to five months to complete. The process involves 10 distinct stages and collaboration between Sucafina’s Global and Country teams, field staff, data analysts, coordinators and subject-matter experts.
The exact process varies depending on the origin, project and complexity of the data. But the focus remains the same: collecting reliable information, understanding what it tells us and making sure the findings accurately reflect the realities of the supply chain.
Asking the Right Questions
Before data collection begins, Sucafina teams work together to design surveys that will capture the information needed to understand progress against the relevant IMPACT Goals. The questions need to reflect how coffee is farmed in the specific origin – from farming practices and harvest cycles to how coffee is produced and sold. as well as local social structures.
Country teams play an important role at this stage, reviewing questions for relevance, clarity and local context and translating them into local languages. They also help prepare field staff who will collect data directly from farmers and farming households.
Local Knowledge Sharpens Insights
The collaboration between Global and Country teams continues throughout data collection and analysis. Local knowledge helps teams understand the context behind the data. “A result that looks unusual in a spreadsheet may have a perfectly reasonable explanation once the specific circumstances of the supply chain are taken into account,” Isaac says.
That's why Country teams remain involved throughout the process – from reviewing survey questions and preparing field teams to validating results and investigating unexpected findings.
Our rigorous IMPACT methodology combined with our boots-on-the-ground approach ensures that the data reflects the realities of the farmers and supply chains it represents.
Understanding the Story Behind the Data
Once the data has been collected and validated, the next step is understanding what it tells us. Sometimes, even when a dataset passes technical validation, the results can raise questions.
For example, a calculation might suggest an unexpectedly high household income, a carbon estimate might look unusually high or low or reported farming practices might appear inconsistent with other information provided by the same farmer.
When this happens, analysts work closely with Global Coordinators and Country teams to investigate the underlying causes. This might involve reviewing field records, discussing how questions were interpreted or looking more closely at patterns across the data.
“Good sustainability data is about more than just technical accuracy. The most valuable insights come from continuous collaboration, asking difficult questions when results do not make sense and working together across countries and disciplines until the story behind the data is understood,” Isaac explains.
This collaborative process enables us to translate complex supply chain data into reliable, actionable insights, giving Sucafina and our partners a clearer picture of progress and where further action may be needed.
From Data to Action
By the time an IMPACT Beyond Report reaches its final review, months of work have gone into producing it. The result is a detailed overview of what has been measured, what has been learned and where further action may be needed.
These insights guide investment, support engagement with supply chain partners and support roasters and partners to track progress toward their own sustainability goals. The reporting process also provides valuable learning that can inform future projects.
Ultimately, each IMPACT Beyond report is part of the accountability that connects investment with results on the ground – providing transparency on progress and helping ensure projects deliver shared value for everyone in the value chain. As Isaac puts it: “Data integrity is everything.”
Interested in finding out how IMPACT can help your business meet its sustainability goals or partnering with us to implement a project in your supply chain? Get in touch with your regular contact.