While agricultural sustainability standards have recently moved from niche to mainstream, there has been very little rigorous evaluation of these standards, especially with regard to conservation impacts. BACP sought to document the actual impact on biodiversity of the use of such certification standards. Two pathways were identified for contributing to this objective.
At a program level, BACP developed an overall M&E plan designed to assess the adoption and replication of best management practices (BMPs) by a range of market actors, and its impact on biodiversity, communities, and markets. At the project level, BACP invested heavily in developing new tools and systems to evaluate conservation impacts of sustainable production at scales ranging from site to region. The development of these tools allowed grantees to see the current state of biodiversity in their landscapes, determine what gaps remain between existing production methods and sustainable production methods, and assess the efficacy of their work to bridge these gaps.