07 Apr 2025
What’s the problem?
UK companies are profiting from supply chains that destroy precious forests worldwide, threaten wildlife, accelerate climate change, and violate the rights of local communities.
The everyday products we buy in the UK – from furniture to food – often have a hidden cost. Whether it's timber for furniture, soy for animal feed, or palm oil in processed foods, we're often unknowingly buying products with devastating environmental and human impacts across the globe.
Precious forests around the world are being destroyed at an alarming rate. From the Amazon to Southeast Asia, UK companies profit from global supply chains that drive this destruction, threatening iconic wildlife like orangutans and jaguars while accelerating climate change.
Indigenous communities and local people around the world are having their land stolen, their homes destroyed, livelihoods disrupted, and their rights violated. And all the while, UK companies have no legal liability for the destruction caused by their own supply chains. Extractive industries are wreaking wildlife habitats and threatening people's lives and livelihoods.
This is how different communities are impacted around the world.
What’s our solution?
We need a new law that requires UK companies to prevent harm to communities and the environment in their supply chains, wherever they operate.
A comprehensive Business, Human Rights, and Environment Act would go far beyond the limited protections in existing legislation, requiring companies to actively prevent environmental and human rights abuses, rather than merely reporting on it after the damage is done.
If companies fail, the law would enable those affected to have a clear path to seek justice in the UK courts. Communities could sue companies for harm to their environment, lives and livelihoods, with the burden of proof on companies to show they took all reasonable steps to prevent harm.
Indigenous peoples and local communities are at the forefront of forest protection, but they need support and recognition from both their own governments and countries like the UK that drive demand for risky forest commodities.
And while governments in affected countries play a critical role in protecting their own forests and communities, they often have weak or poorly enforced laws. The UK is falling behind other countries like France, Germany and New Zealand which already have similar laws in place.
We urgently need a new UK law to hold UK companies to account.
The Planet Over Profit campaign
83% of the British public support new laws to stop environmental abuses in supply chains. But we need the UK government to act.
The Labour government has committed to “assess the best ways to prevent environmental harms, modern slavery and human and labour rights abuses in both private and public sector supply chains including effective due diligence rules”. Now is our opportunity to hold them to that commitment.
The Planet Over Profit campaign aims to:
- Build public and political support for a new law.
- Expose UK corporate links to deforestation, environmental harm and human rights abuses.
- Support partners in the global south and impacted communities to achieve their campaigning goals.
We're campaigning for a Business, Human Rights, and Environment Act with the Corporate Justice Coalition, as part of a larger alliance of human rights and environmental justice organisations and trade unions.
We’re also proudly working alongside partners in affected countries like WALHI (Friends of the Earth Indonesia) and Indigenous Peoples organisation SAVE Rivers to amplify the voices of those campaigning on the frontlines of deforestation and human rights abuses.
And far from being anti-business, there is widespread support for a new law from 50 companies including Sainsbury’s, Aviva, as well as investors with $4.5 trillion under management who see a clear need for a new law to level the playing field.
A number of MPs and Peers have also pledged for a new law. But we urgently need more politicians to join our call. And we need your help to make that happen.
The role of local action groups
Friends of the Earth local action groups have a critical role to play in the Planet Over Profit campaign.
We need local action groups to build support for the new law in their communities – through organising creative activities, eye-catching stunts and engaging events, through getting the message out via social and local media, and through working with local partners and coalitions.
And crucially, we need groups to harness this community support to persuade their MPs to support the new law.
Local action groups will also play an important role in supporting the efforts of international activists at the forefront of protecting their environment and communities, and in highlighting UK corporate links to overseas environmental destruction and human rights abuses.
Campaign timeline
- May 2025: we’ll organise photo stunts to catch the eye of the local media and create a buzz on social media.
- Summer 2025: we’ll get out in our communities to drum up support for the campaign via creative family-friendly activities and summer stalls.
- November 2025: as the world’s eyes turn to Brazil’s COP30 conference, we’ll take our message of UK-driven deforestation to the streets.
- Winter 2025 and spring 2026: we’ll bring people together in bigger numbers for community events up and down the country, showing the growing public support for a new law.
- Summer 2026: we’ll ramp up our political campaigning, including focusing our efforts on those with the most power to enact a new law.
- Autumn 2026: a new Business, Human Rights and Environment Act is announced in the Kings Speech.
