To start, please tell me about yourself and your career journey so far.
My name is Ben French. I’m based in London and work at Czarnikow as Global Head of the Vive programme. I’ve been with Czarnikow for 15 years, working across bulk, shipping and chartering in the early days, then structuring supply chains for white refined sugar in sub-Saharan Africa, particularly moving South African sugar cross-border into Zimbabwe, Mozambique and East Africa.
I later moved to Singapore for eight years as Czarnikow broadened into a wider multi-commodity supply chain service, and my role expanded accordingly. I remained closely involved in raw and refined sugar while helping to build the multi-commodity approach and to launch Vive in Asia, expanding from an initial Sub-Saharan focus to a service for our industrial and producer clients to align on sustainability.
I come from a farming family in Scotland, studied agriculture, spent some time in shipping, and then returned to agriculture. My only exposure to sugar before Czarnikow was a bit of UK beet farming and a copy of The Sugar Trading Manual sent for my interview.
If you had to explain Vive to a trading desk in 60 seconds, what would you say?
Vive is a multi-commodity sustainability verification programme for commodity supply chains. It began with sugar but now covers multiple commodities, and its core purpose is to help producers align with the sustainability requirements of industrial buyers, regulators, banks, and other stakeholders.
In practical terms, we map the market’s needs for sustainable, regenerative, or carbon-measured products, and then help producers reach that level in a commercially viable way, so that real supply chains of sustainable products can form rather than just one-off certified volumes.
I see on your website that Vive is a joint venture between Czarnikow and Intellync. Our readers will all know Czarnikow, but tell me about Intellync.
When we designed Vive, we sought to avoid any conflict of interest between Czarnikow’s commercial activities and the integrity of sustainability assessments. Czarnikow helps to develop a programme’s strategy and commercial development, but is not involved in conducting or influencing assessments or their outcomes.
Our partner, Intellync, 100% owned by AB Agri (part of Associated British Foods), has extensive experience in building sustainability frameworks and due diligence platforms for supermarkets and industry across sectors such as dairy, tobacco, and cotton. They have no commercial involvement in the commodities themselves, but they have decades of experience extracting, structuring, and verifying data across complex supply chains.
The joint venture combines Czarnikow’s 175 years of market intelligence and agricultural commodity-supply-chain expertise with Intellync’s 25 years of experience in sustainability platforms and verification, enabling Vive to build demand-led, data-driven sustainability solutions that work across complex supply chains, from large, mechanised operations to smallholders.
When Vive was founded, what market gap did Czarnikow identify? Having founded it, what is your USP?
We didn’t set out to replace existing certification schemes but to tackle two specific problems: the pace and precision of change, and the weak commercial link between certification and demand. Many certification efforts across the commodity sector were conducted in isolation from actual supply chains, with producers investing in certification without reliable market access or a tangible commercial return, especially when focused on local or “wet” markets. If that return never materialises, the investment is hard to sustain.
Our aim with Vive was not to certify the entire sugar sector, but to measure success by the number and volume of sustainable supply chains we could help create, in which value flows back along the chain from end user to farmer, miller, and refiner.
The USP is that Vive is a commercially aligned, market-driven programme built around continuous improvement and demand alignment rather than policing the industry against a fixed academic standard. Producers can effectively “stack” criteria under one umbrella to access specific markets, and we benchmark our criteria against major standards and regulations while keeping them practical and applicable.
You describe Vive as a verification, not a certification, model. Why did you go that route?
We chose verification to provide flexibility and speed in a fast‑changing landscape of sustainability requirements, regulations, and methodologies. Verification allows us to adapt the programme to new market needs without multi‑year revision cycles, while still ensuring proper stakeholder engagement and maintaining robust criteria.
Philosophically, we did not set out to police the sector with a rigid standard; instead, we align market needs with what producers can do, and then verify what is actually in place on the ground. Participants enter a continuous improvement journey: we verify governance, policies, and practices against our verification standard rather than simply passing or failing them against a fixed certification threshold.
Our Vive claim level is benchmarked against the requirements of more than 100 major food and beverage companies, a range of EU regulations, and several schemes, including ProTerra, Smartcane BMP, and Bonsucro (via an independent benchmark commissioned by a large beverage company). The criteria are robust, but delivery is more flexible and can be updated. Over time, if regulation in a given commodity or region requires full certification, we would not rule out adding a certification layer alongside verification to ensure we can continue to provide producers with a viable route to market.
On your website, you describe yourselves as fully embedded in the supply chain. What does this look like on a day-to-day basis, and how does it differ from a conventional audit model?
Being embedded means we understand and verify the full chain of custody and traceability from the farm to the final buyer, rather than simply auditing a single node in isolation. For example, sugar supply chains are notoriously complex, with multiple routes to market: a Thai mill selling white sugar directly to an industrial user is very different from a Brazilian VHP mill selling to a trader, then to a refiner, then re‑exporting.
Driving sustainable volume and ensuring value flows back along the chain requires a deep understanding of how commodities move, who handles them, where the risks lie, and how traceability is maintained. Czarnikow itself facilitates the supply of Vive products but is assessed under the same chain-of-custody module as any other business or trader that can trade Vive products.
Across the Vive team, we combine specialists in regenerative agriculture, deforestation, and carbon with decades of hands‑on experience building commodity supply chains. That mixture of technical sustainability expertise and supply chain know‑how is what “embedded” means in practice.
Could you give me an example of how that embedded approach has affected change in practice?
Once we help create a supply chain that is commercially viable and repeatable, the real impact is when it continues without our hand‑holding every transaction. We now see refiners selling significant volumes of Vive products directly to their industrial clients, and those refiners in turn sourcing Vive raw sugar from origins like Brazil at a premium because they see the value.
There is no fixed premium for Vive; we encourage fair value to be negotiated and premiums to be paid when required. Importantly, value can be realised through market access, long‑term contracts, or improved financing, rather than relying exclusively on a headline price uplift. We are also working closely with trade finance providers through Vive Investor Assurance. The cost of capital for farmers and millers is often a more critical lever than a small premium on a fraction of their volume. Banks and private credit funds are keen to channel more working capital into sustainable production.
If we can help producers demonstrate robust, verified ESG performance, that can translate into better financing terms, which are often more meaningful to them than a modest price premium.
Is the system self-financing, or even profitable, for a producer?
That is our goal, but we are cautious about making sweeping promises. In the past, many sustainability programmes claimed that certification would automatically deliver meaningful premiums, yet for a long time the underlying demand was neither strong nor broad enough to justify those claims. We are deliberate in explaining what Vive can and cannot do. Joining the programme is not a magic switch; it requires effort and active engagement from management and commercial teams to unlock benefits through marketing, sales, financing, and customer relationships.
We see two types of participants: those who invest in understanding and leveraging Vive, and those who join and then expect the benefits to arrive automatically. For the first group, we regularly see more than full recovery of participation costs, and in some cases very attractive returns; for the second group, results are naturally more limited. Overall, participants more than cover their costs, but outcomes depend heavily on how proactively they use the programme.
Do you share best practices for productivity at the farm and the mill? Do participants sometimes achieve productivity and cost-reduction gains through your program?
Yes, and that aspect is becoming increasingly important. Our offering to producers has four tiers. First is the core Vive responsible sourcing framework, which is now broadly aligned with what over 100 major food and beverage companies expect in ESG risk coverage and is convergent with global frameworks such as SAI FSA. This baseline already embeds many agronomic and operational best practices; for example, within the farm module, we may guide participants towards soil sampling and more precise fertiliser application, which can improve yields or reduce input costs over time.
Second is our regenerative agriculture module, Vive Regen Ag, developed in response to rising interest in and investment in regenerative practices. Rather than simply ticking off a list of techniques such as minimum tillage or cover cropping, we verify that the right practices are applied in the right context, based on appropriate pre‑implementation analysis, so that “regenerative” does not become an empty marketing claim.
Third is our Vive Climate Action carbon measurement tool, a primary-data-based system certified for any arable crop and widely used in the sugar sector, now covering around 40% of Vive participants. We calculate individual footprints using real farm and mill data, benchmark them against country and regional averages, and highlight hotspots where decarbonisation and efficiency improvements are possible.
Finally, we are developing “smart carbon sourcing” models within supply sheds, enabling mills to identify low-carbon crop streams and connect them with buyers willing to pay a premium for reduced-carbon products. This can catalyse the expansion of best practice across a wider area, and over time it should translate into both lower emissions and better resource efficiency.
Do you put the carbon footprint or the Vive logo on retail packets?
It can be done, but it has not been a major focus. One reason sugar has historically lagged cocoa, coffee, bananas, soy, and palm in the certified or verified share of global production is consumer perception. Products such as coffee and chocolate have strong, distinctive flavours and origin stories, and consumers are accustomed to seeing detailed information on the front of the pack about origin, fair trade, organic status, and so on. Sugar, by contrast, is often seen as a generic ingredient—sucrose—listed in small print on the back rather than as a hero on the front, so there has been less direct consumer pull for sustainability claims on sugar retail packs.
That said, NGO reports such as Oxfam’s “Sugar Rush” in 2013 raised awareness among industrial buyers of social and environmental risks in sugar supply chains, and this has driven much of the current demand from the B2B side. We do see some use of the Vive logo on industrial bags in certain jurisdictions, and it may play a more visible role in non‑food uses of sugar, such as biomaterials or textiles, where consumers are increasingly interested in the sustainability of fibres and materials. But for now, most of the demand we respond to comes from industrial buyers rather than consumers at the supermarket shelf.
Listening to you, Ben, you seem proud of what you’re doing, and rightly so. Is there a project or a supply chain you’re particularly proud of?
We are active in around 25 markets, and each completed Vive supply chain represents a great deal of work and collaboration, so there is pride in each one. The ones that stand out most are those where we have uncovered serious issues and then seen genuine improvement over several years, rather than simply recognising those already performing well.
In parts of Southeast Asia, for example, we have found significant non‑compliances in smallholder supply that clearly failed to meet any global standard. As we are not an NGO that publishes everyone’s shortcomings, mills are more willing to let us in, to get a clear picture of what is happening, and to work with us on remediation rather than retreat. In some cases, mills were genuinely unaware of what was happening at the fringes of their cane supply; after we reported the findings, they implemented farm checks, training, and improved due diligence, and, over time, progressed to the Vive claim level.
From a commercial perspective, I’m also proud of the long, complex supply chains we’ve painstakingly aligned, bringing together farms, mills, traders, refiners, and end users—often convincing the last reluctant actor, such as a refiner, to come on board—so that everyone is “singing from the same song sheet” and a long‑term, repeatable, sustainable partnership is established.
I see from your website that you have numerous buyers supporting the programme. What does that entail?
We are not a paid membership scheme, but we realised early on that when you sit with a mill deep in a cane‑growing region and talk about demand for sustainable products on the other side of the world, it can feel abstract. To bridge that gap, we created the “Buyers Supporting Vive” platform, which is free for buyers. Any buyer who has completed due diligence against our criteria and governance and is comfortable with the programme can sign up to indicate that Vive is an acceptable pathway for them.
There is no obligation to buy Vive products or to grant exclusivity, but it gives producers a clear view of which major buyers recognise the programme and where potential opportunities lie. It has proven powerful in practice: several of the world’s top food and beverage companies have signed up, and we are increasingly seeing interest from sectors beyond food and beverage, such as biofuels and textiles.
Because Vive is multi‑commodity and uses a common carbon calculator and framework across crops such as cane and corn, buyers in biofuels or aviation fuel can compare sustainability performance across feedstocks on a like‑for‑like basis, rather than trying to reconcile different schemes and methodologies.
One of the themes I’ve been writing about recently is that sustainability is now taking a back seat to food security. Are people more interested in food security than in sustainability? Aren’t they essentially the same thing?
In practice, they are deeply intertwined. Food security has its own metrics and debates, but long‑term food security depends on sustainable and increasingly regenerative production: you need resilient yields, functioning ecosystems, and compliant, stable operations to secure supply over decades.
Look, for instance, at parts of the Middle East, where moving freight in and out has become more challenging, and some countries rely on imports for up to 90% of their food needs. Historically, food security strategies often focused on holding stocks at destination, but there is now a shift towards investing upstream in farmland and production to control the timing and reliability of supply more directly.
Once you are investing at origin, you care not only about immediate availability but also about long‑term yield, workforce stability, regulatory compliance, and climate resilience. All of these are closely linked to sustainability practices. Rather than food security replacing sustainability, we see them converging: sustainable, resilient production is a core foundation of food security, not a competing priority.
What role do you expect technologies such as remote sensing, AI analytics, blockchain-style platforms, and traceability to play in the future? How do you see them evolving?
These technologies will be important, but they are only as good as the data they receive and the realities on the ground. There has been a wave of enthusiasm for blockchain and digital platforms, and they can be impressive in terms of visualisation and data handling. However, without robust first-mile data—accurate sourcing, barcoding, warehousing, and trucking information—a beautifully designed platform will still contain weak or incomplete information.
We saw this with the EUDR, where many initial responses focused on building platforms, while we felt the priority should be to get on the ground and work out how to trace products reliably from the first mile. That said, AI and automation have real potential to reduce the cost and time of verification by supporting risk‑based approaches and streamlining data analysis, thereby making robust verification more accessible.
The key caveat is that none of this replaces “boots on the ground”: you still need auditors and specialists to visit operations, talk to people, and look around corners. A system based purely on remote questionnaires and automated inference would be both easier to manipulate and less able to detect issues you did not know to ask about. For us, technology will augment, not replace, high‑quality fieldwork and assurance.
For producers, traders, or buyers who are still on the fence, what is the one step you’d like them to take after this conversation?
There are really two fences: whether to engage with sustainability at all, and which programme to use.
For those still wondering whether to engage, I’d urge them to recognise that regulation and market expectations are steadily moving sustainability from optional to mandatory. Rather than fearing that shift, it helps to see sustainability as another service area where experienced providers can support you—much like price risk management or trade finance—rather than as an extra layer of policing. The resource commitment is often less daunting than people imagine, provided they have the right guidance.
For those choosing between programmes, I would encourage them to look beyond box‑ticking and ask what each programme delivers for their business: how it supports commercial opportunities, aligns with target customers, ensures regulatory compliance, and builds long‑term resilience. Different commodities and markets may require different tools, but the central question is what outcomes you want—market access, financing, risk management—and which programme best helps you achieve them.
Last question: what question should I have asked you but didn’t ask?
I think the missing question is: why are we doing this, both as a company and personally?
From Czarnikow’s perspective, as we evolved from a traditional sugar broker into a broader supply chain services company, sustainability became an essential part of our service set. Our clients increasingly needed robust sustainability data and support, just as they needed risk management, financing, and market analysis, so it was natural that we should build a capability in that area. This has also deepened our relationships with both producers and buyers, moving us away from a narrow “trader” identity towards a partnership that helps them develop their own businesses.
Internally, Vive has been important for culture and recruitment: many of the people joining Czarnikow today want to work for a company that aims to create a positive impact while remaining commercially disciplined, and the programme has become a focal point for this.
On a personal level, I come from a long line of farmers and have spent 15 years in commodity markets, witnessing both excellent and very poor agricultural practices. I feel a responsibility, given my position running Vive, to help steer things in the right direction—towards better-managed farms, better treatment of workers, and more sustainable yields. That “poacher turned gamekeeper” element is a big part of why I do it.
Thank you, Ben, for your time and input.
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