TIAA-CREF

Reporting by Agência Pública has revealed how investors including U.S. pension funds and an Argentine agribusiness giant may be linked to illegal land deals and deforestation in Brazil’s Cerrado region.

Banks, retirement funds, retail investors, boutique asset managers, and even some nonprofits and universities are doubling down on farmland investments, making it increasingly difficult for farmers of color to access land.

Quienes actualmente controlan los flujos financieros del mundo no son capaces de apoyar a los productores de alimentos y a los sistemas alimentarios —que pueden combatir la crisis climática o las muchas otras crisis que afectan a la alimentación y a la agricultura. Nuestro desafío es lograr que tanto las tierras agrícolas como el dinero no sigan en sus manos, tan pronto como podamos.

Retirement system is largest manager of farmland in the world - that contributes to land-grabbing, deforestation and human rights violations

Carbon credits and net-zero pledges are fuelling a new round of farmland buying by billionaires and pension funds that will undermine real climate action.

The University of Iowa Faculty Senate voted 42 to 7 to pass a resolution calling on the university to hold the financial services provider TIAA accountable for its investments in global farmland.

The TIAA-Divest! campaign demands that TIAA "stop land grabs," as TIAA is one of the two largest foreign buyers in Brazil and many of its landholdings lead to displacement of local communities and deforestation.

Resolution adopted by the Professional Staff Congress, a union that represents 30,000 faculty and staff at the City University of New York and the CUNY Research Foundation.

Nuveen's head of sustainability will support Westchester's response to rising investor demand for carbon neutral portfolios, providing scalable, natural solutions to counter climate change through farmland investments.

Resolution by Cornell's University Assembly also calls on its main pension fund supplier to divest from agribusiness companies associated with deforestation, indigenous rights violations, and severe climate impacts.

Global commodities giant Cargill continues to buy soybeans from a farm in Brazil that cultivates on illegally acquired and deforested land, including lands acquired by US teachers’ pension fund TIAA.

The United University Professions' resolution calls for an end to TIAA landholdings “associated with deforestation and human rights abuses".