New global platform to bring clarity and openness to supply chain traceability tools
Preferred by Nature and WWF, funded by the ISEAL Innovations Fund, are launching a global platform to compare and verify supply chain traceability tools for legality, sustainability, and deforestation-free sourcing.
Transparency and supply chain data are no longer optional – they have become the norm. Companies increasingly need reliable information about their supply chains, production areas, and compliance with legality and sustainability requirements. In response, a growing number of technology providers now offer digital tools to map supply chains, conduct due diligence, and monitor producers’ compliance.
But with so many options emerging, it has become harder to navigate the landscape. Which tool is right for my needs? How secure is the data, and can it be shared smoothly with suppliers and customers? These are the questions many companies face as they try to balance compliance, efficiency, and trust.
To address this, Preferred by Nature, in partnership with WWF, has launched a project called the Traceability Tools Platform to improve transparency and comparability across digital traceability and monitoring tools in global commodity supply chains. It will help companies, sustainability systems, auditors, and other stakeholders identify solutions that meet needs from deforestation-free sourcing to labour rights, and legal compliance across agriculture, forestry, and fisheries.
“We are setting the standard for best practice in transparency, data ownership, data sharing, and ethical handling. This enables both businesses and consumers to make choices that drive real impact for people, nature, and climate.”
Peter Feilberg
Executive Director, Preferred by Nature
The Traceability Tools Platform – What does it do?
- Compares tools – Side-by-side evaluation of digital traceability solutions
- Clear criteria – Standardised assessments on scope, data flow, verification, interoperability
- Independent checks – Verification to confirm providers’ claims
- User filters – Helps companies find tools that match their needs
Setting the standard
With rising regulatory and market pressure, many actors are adopting digital tools to collect and share supply chain data, establish traceability of end products to forests and farms, and monitor deforestation in commodity supply areas. Yet with dozens of options—and little clarity on their functionality—it is difficult to know which are best suited for different contexts.
The Traceability Tools Platform responds by creating a public online hub where tools are compared side-by-side and assessed using structured indicators. The platform will incorporate a feature framework for comparing tools covering data flow, data security, geospatial monitoring, tool provider services and other features. It will also pilot a verification mechanism for independent assessment.
“Traceability is no longer optional – it’s essential for doing business. Yet with so many tools in the market, companies and producers struggle to know who to trust and what fulfils the need. With the Traceability Tools Platform we are setting the standard for best practice in transparency, data ownership and data sharing. This enables both businesses and consumers to make choices that drive real impact for people, nature, and climate,” said Peter Feilberg, Executive Director of Preferred by Nature.
Choosing the right tools
“In the global push to protect forests and combat illegal logging, deforestation, and other threats, digital traceability and monitoring tools hold great promise,” said Jason Grant, Manager, Corporate Engagement at WWF. “But their proliferation and rapid evolution make it hard to know which are most effective, and this acts as a brake on progress. The Traceability Tools Platform will help users evaluate key features, choose tools that fit, and hopefully create a race to the top among providers.”
“As traceability becomes a license to operate in certain sectors, there has been a proliferation of digital platforms—each with different scope and functionality,” said Josh Taylor, Traceability Manager at ISEAL. “Companies need clarity on what these tools can do, and how they compare. Transparency will help mature the market and move us on from pilots to scaled implementation.”
Prototype in development
Led by Preferred by Nature and WWF US, the project brings together sustainability systems, tool developers, and companies. Developers will be invited to complete a standardised self-assessment, with selected tools undergoing independent verification. A prototype platform will be piloted to test functionality and value.
By project end, stakeholders will gain access to a standardised evaluation framework, a searchable online platform with customisable filters. Tool providers can choose to get the data provided verified and the functionality tested. These tools will appear as verified on the platform. The long-term vision is to enable users to select the right tools that fit their needs and ensure clarity on data exchange, ownership and ethical data handling in the supply chains.
This project is made possible thanks to a grant from the ISEAL Innovations Fund, which is supported by the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) and UK International Development from the UK government. Consultation on criteria, platform design is undergoing, and the first testing platform is expected to be ready in Q1 2026.
