Tracing the Thai cassava () trade network, between 1960 and 2000, offers a compelling example of global complexity at work. The emergence of Thailand's dominance of world export markets caught the world by surprise. The opening up of a European market for cassava was supposed to be met by Brazilian and Indonesian producers. Instead, Thailand took over the market by 1975. Several factors facilitated this emergence including: entrepreneurial diasporic networks of Thai-Chinese traders, local political economy conditions in both Europe and Thailand, and ecological conditions in Thailand. These same factors also shaped the subsequent timing of the closing of the European market, the emergence of a new industry association, the creation of new cassava products, and the expansion to other markets. Furthermore, the dynamic nature of cassava market yielded equivocal outcomes for both Europe and Thai farmers.

Land is a key input in economic production and production-waste sink. This links land to the causes of and responses to climate change. The dominant climate action ideas are based on the concept of 'land tenure security' which, in a global context marked by land-based inequities, means ratifying what already exists. This reinforces undemocratic social structures and institutions that themselves contribute to climate change. A restructuring of global land politics is called for, without which any analyses of and responses to climate change are at best superficial, and at worst, flawed and self-defeating. What is needed is to acknowledge the pervasive land-based social inequities in the world, and to end such inequities by pursuing a redistribution of a range of access to a range of land and resources in ways that categorically benefit the working people.

The effective integration of the economic, social and environmental dimensions of sustainability by actors in all sectors is a core objective of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Do trade unions, as important socio-economic actors, contribute to this agenda by aligning with environmental concerns? We conducted a qualitative content analysis of primary documentary sources from the International and European Trade Union Confederations focussing on the 2012-2022 period. We complemented this with in-depth interviews from The Netherlands and Belgium. We found that trade unions have been 'greening' their discourses and initiatives, and cooperating more with environmental movements. They also use the SDGs not only as discursive frames, but also to shape concrete initiatives. However, they overwhelmingly see greening still in instrumental terms rather than as a transformative prioritization of environmental concerns. This is reflected in their engagement with the SDGs, as unions shape the implementation of the SDGs according to their priorities.