Jonathan Horn

Global supply chains under pressure share a critical yet often overlooked weakness: the first mile. This early stage, where raw materials originate, accounts for roughly 60% of supply chain risk and volatility. Despite its importance, many organisations still lack the transparency and data needed to properly manage this stage, even as it comes under increasing strain from shifting regulatory demands, resource constraints and the impacts of climate change.

The challenges are especially pronounced in nature-based commodity supply chains, where extreme weather events, land degradation, dwindling water resources and inefficiencies in operations can have significant repercussions for businesses and their end customers.

Importantly, disruption in the first mile has far-reaching effects that extend well beyond its starting point. It ripples through organisations and their wider networks, influencing production schedules, delivery timelines, financing and investment choices, contractual commitments, and the capacity to substantiate ESG and responsible sourcing assertions.

Treefera Co-Founders Jonathan Horn and Caroline Grey believe the problem stems from a lack of clear and actionable data from the crucial first mile, a problem their innovative company was created to solve. 

“Our world runs on nature-based commodities, yet information on the physical source of these assets remains largely invisible to the systems that depend on them,” adds Co-Founder and CEO Jonathan. “Risk and volatility are increasing and supply chains are less predictable in a world being driven by temperature change. Nature-based assets like coffee, cacao, palm oil or rubber are profoundly affected by that.

“Sourcing is less resilient and healthy, requiring a far greater need for forecasting and scenario modelling and there are increasing compliance requirements including regulations like the EU Deforestation Regulations (EUDR),” he says. “Companies and investors are compelled to clearly understand where products in their supply chain come from, making the need to get primary data from the first mile a commercial imperative – there’s no longer any choice.”

The genesis for Treefera came to Jonathan during his previous work in investment banking, including at J.P. Morgan, an environment where there is no room for ambiguity and risk, precision and decision making at scale underpinned by strong data are essential.

“While working on how we could create better data sets on nature-based assets on the first mile of commodity supply chains, I found it incredibly difficult to get the data in a form that could be ingested, processed and actionable,” he says. “I saw a clear opportunity to bring the same quantitative discipline and modelling frameworks used in finance to the natural world and build a platform that enables forecasting, pricing and portfolio-level decision making based on real world environmental and carbon risk.”

Treefera’s platform is based on a clear premise: clear data drives clear decisioning. It is robust, flexible and industry agnostic, providing packaged and configurable solutions for sourcing, risk mitigation and compliance. It has already supported enterprises across the energy, agriculture, insurance, pharmaceuticals and forestry industries, as well as global professionals services. 

The unmatched visibility it provides into the origin, flow and health of critical commodities helps these kinds or organisations to improve supply chain integrity, enable faster project validation and meet increasingly stringent ESG and sustainability ambitions. 

To read the full story in the magazine, click HERE.