Success story: Aphea.Bio

Astanor’s approach is to support each of our portfolio companies through the lens of ESG and impact as both are necessary to achieve a sustainable and resilient agrifood system. From the beginning of our collaboration, we worked with Aphea.Bio to build an individualized engagement roadmap to improve their ESG profile and scale their full impact potential over the course of our investment.

Life cycle assessment as first mission

One of our first missions was to accompany Aphea.Bio in the completion of their first life cycle assessment (LCA), a comprehensive assessment of the environmental footprint of a product. As per our process, this is a requirement for any company that has an impact on any of our three planet KPIs – GHG emissions avoided, water use and biodiversity.

The quantified data from environmental LCAs provides invaluable information for companies such as Aphea.Bio as it allows them to understand the impact created by their products and to map out which areas might pose risks or provide opportunities for market developments or process improvement as the company scales. In addition to guiding the company through the LCA process and introducing them to our external partners that support our companies in conducting LCAs, we have also supported Aphea.Bio in going beyond the LCA process. The goal is to further understand the impact of their product on soil and aquatic biodiversity by connecting them with research groups and universities.

Building ESG capabilities and assessments, support

The Astanor team also actively supports Aphea.Bio in building its ESG capabilities. Annual ESG assessments allow us to evaluate our portfolio companies' ESG capabilities in comparison to their peers and identify where their internal practices need to be reinforced.

We have supported Aphea.Bio in obtaining the B Corp certification, a leading sustainability standard, by facilitating an introduction to our B Corp consulting partners, which assisted in the certification process.

We also supported Aphea.Bio in conducting its first carbon footprint exercise in 2022. Aphea.Bio gained several key learnings from this exercise. First, the majority of emissions are within Scope 3 (indirect GHG emissions) although the inherent complexity of understanding the upstream and downstream emissions of the entire value chain makes it the most difficult to calculate. Secondly, Aphea.Bio established the right processes to identify which data points to collect as well as their sources to improve data quality for further carbon footprint exercises.

Creating impact committees within portfolio companies

Astanor supports the creation of impact committees within our portfolio companies in order to ensure sustainability is embedded within the roots of the company. These committees are dedicated to overseeing and implementing ESG and impact strategies with a direct communication channel to the governing body of the company. This approach brings all the stakeholders around the same table and ensures sustainability is being dealt with in a structured way.

Through these ever-evolving efforts, we give our portfolio companies the opportunity to anchor sustainability values and impact creation to the core of their DNA early-on in their development, something Aphea.Bio has done in an exemplary manner.