Canopy (sometimes styled as Canopy Planet) is an international solutions-based environmental nonprofit organization with a mission to protect the world’s Ancient and Endangered Forests, advance the rights of Indigenous communities, and shift major industrial supply chains toward sustainable, circular materials. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Canopy founder & Executive Director Nicole Rycroft to gain a deeper understanding of the environmental nonprofit organization.
Nicole Rycroft’s Background
Could you tell me more about your background? Rycroft said:
“I am the Founder and Executive Director of Canopy, the award-winning solutions driven environmental not-for-profit that’s shifting global supply chains to keep the world’s forests standing and bring low-carbon, circular alternatives to market at scale.”
“For over two decades, I’ve led systems-level change—transforming unsustainable production models, forging unlikely partnerships, and proving that what’s good for the planet can also be good for business. I’m an Australian-born former elite rower turned environmental strategist.”
“Under my leadership, Canopy, with the help of our partners, has catalyzed the conservation of 39+ million hectares of forest and secured commitments from 1,000+ global companies, innovators, and producers —with collective revenues exceeding $2 trillion—to eliminate Ancient and Endangered Forests from their paper, packaging, and fashion supply chains.”
“From greening the Harry Potter book series to landing a $60 million investment from The Audacious Project, my track record shows what’s possible when strategy, persistence, and ambition align.”
“A TED speaker and UBS Global Visionary, I am also an Ashoka Fellow and the recipient of numerous accolades, including the 2020 Climate Breakthrough Award, a Canadian Environment Gold Medal, the Meritorious Service Cross of Canada, and a place on the 2024 Business of Fashion 500.”
“My guiding mantra—ask for what you want, you might just get it—has made me an influential voice in the global movement for forest conservation and circular innovation.”
Formation Of Canopy
How did the idea for Canopy come together? Rycroft shared:
“In 1999, I founded Canopy to transform unsustainable systems that were driving deforestation and forest degradation. Forest degradation was – and continues to be – largely driven by market demand for paper, packaging and forest-based textiles. In fact, every year, over 3.4 billion trees are logged to make paper packaging and fabrics like viscose and rayon, with much of that logging occurring in irreplaceable Ancient and Endangered Forests. We set out to shift that.”
“Canopy’s work has focused on building the economic conditions to incentivize logging companies and governments to change business-as-usual and to decouple their operations from virgin forest fibre – especially the world’s most climate and nature critical landscapes. We have helped create that value proposition for this shift away from high-carbon forest fibre sourcing and towards circular Next Gen alternatives by developing deep partnerships with 1000+ brands, retailers, publishers, and companies, including H&M, Inditex, Penguin-Random House, and Walmart.”
“Next Gen solutions are low-carbon, circular alternatives that utilize waste such as discarded textiles, agricultural residues, and food waste, as inputs rather than forests. Next Gen products carry ~4 tonnes less carbon per tonne of product, require 50 – 60% less water in the manufacturing stage, and offer numerous performance and business benefits. With scientists clear on the fact that we need to conserve 30 – 50% of the world’s forests by 2030, Canopy is focused on diversifying the fibre basket by catalyzing the production of 60 million tonnes of Next Gen pulp for packaging, paper, and textile production by 2033. That will replace all Ancient and Endangered Forest and a full third of all forests currently in the manufacturing fibre basket.”
Core Offerings
What are Canopy’s core offerings? Rycroft explained:
“Canopy is a not-for-profit business ecosystem enabler – building and facilitating the market for Next Gen solutions. Canopy supports brands to develop clear sourcing policies to ensure their supply chains are free of high-risk and high-carbon forests. We support brands to troubleshoot and eliminate risk from their conventional supply chains and work with them to develop solution pathways that bring circular solutions to scale. We currently work collaboratively with more than 1000 brands, retailers, and publishers that represent about $2.1 trillion.”
“We connect innovators with conventional producers – and brands with producers that are diversifying their fibre baskets to include Next Gen alternatives into their products. We are also working to mobilize the scale and types of finance needed to unlock this infrastructure transition—an estimated $78 billion by 2033. Market pull-through is a key derisker for this new value chain.”
“Accelerating solutions that protect biodiversity, stabilize our climate, and build resilient industries for the long haul is the focus of Canopy’s work.”
Investing In Next Gen Materials
What is the business case for investing in Next Gen materials? Rycroft highlighted:
“Conventional forest-based supply chains present increased volatility and risk to investors, producers, and customer companies. An accelerated transition to Next Gen alternatives is being driven by:
- Regulatory risks: Policy regulations in key markets, such as the EU (including the EU Deforestation Regulation) and China (including China’s 14th 5-year plan), are mandating shifts in supply and manufacturing inputs for textiles and paper products. A growing body of regulations is both constraining controversial wood fibre from key markets as well as requiring minimum circular/low-impact content.
- Technical performance: Next Gen innovators have shown that many Next Gen products outperform their virgin counterparts. The fibre of textile innovator, Nanollose, was found to be “stronger than wood and finer than silk”. Some agricultural residue fibres for paper can have greater tensile strengths, or superior coating qualities, and so have a performance advantage. Some of the Next Gen fibres can enable lightweighting of packaging, thereby saving costs in both packaging manufacturing and transportation.
- Competitive IRR: Next Gen producers (existing agri-residue paper producers) and innovators ready to scale – present investors with commercially competitive returns.
- Strong and growing markets to derisk new tech: Large companies – from Inditex and Amazon, to Ben and Jerry’s and Target – are increasingly looking for low-risk and resilient supply chains. For brands, Next Gen materials reduce their regulatory risks, build supply chain resiliency, and the confidence that they will be able to secure the quality of materials that their operations need in 5- and 20-year periods. Most of Canopy’s 1000+ brand partners have explicit policy commitments and/or public targets about preferencing Next Gen materials, and a significant number are investing the necessary (human and financial) capital to pull early-to-market Next Gen products through to market, as well as investing in Series A, B, or C of the innovators.
- Conventional supply volatility: Climate change is increasing extreme weather events in forest regions – e.g., one Canadian province, Quebec, lost the equivalent of 10 years of forest fibre supply in the Summer 2023 forest fires. Forest fires are increasing in intensity and frequency, which is creating volatility in forest-based supply chains, and a priority to shift to more circular inputs such as discarded textiles or agricultural residues. Climate-caused supply chain disruptions are projected to account for as much as $120 billion in losses by 2026.
- Diversifying the fibre basket increases resiliency: The flip side of the volatility of conventional linear production is the resilience that sourcing from circular inputs brings to the supply chain. Next Gen inputs are by-products of other production systems and currently cause secondary pollution and environmental problems that governments are keen to address (e.g., India’s stubble/straw burn every year triggers extreme pollution issues and a public health crisis. That straw can be used to make high-quality papers and packaging, deliver value-added revenue streams to farmers, and alleviate a major cause of respiratory illness.
- Water efficient: The pulp industry is one of the most water-intensive industries in the world. Water shortages associated with a warming planet mean that multiple pulp mills are likely to become stranded assets as they won’t be able to run year-round. Next Gen solutions require substantially less water, energy, and chemicals to produce – and will meet the needs of a water and energy-constrained world that is projected.”
Total Addressable Market
What total addressable market size is the organization pursuing? Rycroft concluded:
“The global wood-pulp market was valued at USD $174 billion in 2024 and is projected to be in excess of USD $223 billion by 2033 with a CAGR of 2.68%. Canopy’s work with brands and value-chain partners is focused on replacing one third of that virgin wood market with Next Gen alternatives. Canopy’s brand partners including H&M, Inditex, Walmart, and LVMH, represent USD $2.1 trillion in annual revenues and are already incorporating Next Gen into their packaging, viscose textiles and paper.”
