Maritime Security Worsens in The Red Sea | Rising Operating Costs Close a Third of Uganda’s Tea Factories | Hydration Concerns Motivate Consumer Purchases

HEAR THE HEADLINES – Maritime Security Concerns Worsen in Suez and The Red Sea | Rising Operating Costs Close a Third of Uganda’s Tea Factories | Hydration Concerns Motivate Consumer Purchases

| NEWSMAKER - Liam Brody, CEO, Committee on Sustainability Assessment (COSA)

| FEATURED – The Committee on Sustainability Assessment (COSA) was established to measure the massive quantity of precise data and the impact of harder-to-quantify, pragmatic ways of measuring sustainability, such as living income calculations, gender inclusion, and next-generation training. In 2005, sustainability pioneers at the United Nations identified the need to harmonize sustainability metrics with science-based credibility. Seven years later, COSA became a not-for-profit public research organization to complete that work. Daniele Giovannucci co-founded COSA to counter what he called “the fluff and ignorance masquerading as development and colossal sums wasted by well-meaning funders.” He championed the “democratization of data,” devising standard metrics for the coffee industry in 2018. COSA, financed partly by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the InterAmerican Development Bank, has since standardized sustainability metrics for 100 Agri-related information technologies. Giovannucci retired in December, and Liam Brody was named his successor. Newly named COSA CEO Liam Brody joins us on the Tea Biz Podcast to explain COSA’s role in intelligence-gathering and developing strategic tools that advance sustainable practices with “good business” underpinnings. He also shares his vision of how artificial intelligence will revolutionize and influence consumer behavior and perception of sustainable practices.

Predictability is Around the Corner – COSA Board Chairman Richard Rogers, in announcing the promotion of Liam Brody to CEO, described him as the right leader to unlock the exponential impact of the organization. Brody “is an accomplished and visionary leader” who can drive the transformative change needed to help tackle today’s sustainability challenges.” Brody says, “It used to be that no matter how smart the human was in this equation, we just couldn’t process all this data ourselves. There were just too many variables. But now, it’s amazing when we start to layer this data together.” He says, "Predictability is around the corner, but here’s the thing that’s missing for a lot of folks: Where’s the system? And how are those systems talking? And how do they interrelate?"

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