RSPO Roundtable Conference Calls for Bold, New Approaches to Transform Sustainable Palm Oil

RT2024 sees new strategic partnerships to better address deforestation, improve smallholder inclusion through climate-smart programmes and drive global demand for RSPO Certified products

Bangkok, Thailand, 11 November 2024: Building upon two decades of impact, the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) has called for more concerted efforts to scale innovation and  drive transformative and systemic change within the sector. Supported by Thailand’s Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives, the RSPO’s Annual Roundtable conference (RT2024) took place in Bangkok from 11 to 13 November, amidst preparations to adopt the RSPO 2024 Standards.

Comprising the 2024 RSPO Principles & Criteria (P&C) and the 2024 RSPO Independent Smallholder (ISH) Standard, the revised Standards bring greater clarity, auditability and implementability, and address market and regulatory relevance, with a strong focus on addressing deforestation, human rights due diligence, and smallholder inclusion in global supply chains.

In his keynote address, RSPO’s first Secretary General, Teoh Cheng Hai, reflected on the organisation’s illustrious journey to become today the gold standard for sustainable palm oil production. He underscored the importance of innovative partnerships as a key strategy for RSPO to evolve as a world-class standard setter that can lead the global sustainable palm oil supply chain in line with the 2030 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

RSPO CEO, Joseph D’Cruz, in his opening remarks, reaffirmed that the RSPO is well positioned to meet the future demands of the industry. “Building on our strong foundations, the RSPO is ready to meet the next 20 years with fortified Standards, enhanced verification systems, and an end-to-end digital certification, trade and traceability architecture powered by data.”

He added that the revised Standards have also been strengthened in their integration with the certification system through RSPO’s certification, trade and traceability platform, prisma, which stands for Palm Resource Information and Sustainability Management. At RT2024, delegates previewed how prisma is built to provide digital data and supply chain traceability and can act as a supporting tool for members to strengthen risk assessment and due diligence for emerging regulatory compliance.

A testament to RSPO’s credibility and reach as a global sustainability organisation, RT2024 witnessed the forging of several strategic partnerships designed to increase the social, environmental and economic benefits in the production and trade of certified sustainable palm oil (CSPO).

Advancing high conservation value protection for sustainable palm oil

At RT2024, RSPO and the High Conservation Value Network (HCVN) renewed a longstanding partnership to promote best practices and innovative approaches to HCV protection. Aligned with the revised RSPO Standards, the parties signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in a shared mission to protect high conservation value (HCV) and high carbon stock (HCS) forests within sustainable palm oil landscapes. The MoU will strengthen the protection of ecosystems, biodiversity, and areas of critical importance for indigenous and local communities.

“By prioritising conservation values as an integral part of sustainable palm oil production, HCVN will continue to collaborate with RSPO to embed HCV protections within sustainable land management practices across palm oil landscapes, setting clearer benchmarks for environmental and social stewardship across the palm oil sector,” said Belinda Bowling, Global Director, HCV Network.

As of 2023, RSPO Certification has protected over 466,600 ha of valuable HCV and HCS forests since adopting the HCV Approach in November 2005 and the HCS Approach in November 2018.

Overall, taking into account other critical ecosystems, RSPO Certification has protected and remediated about 646,700 ha of valuable forests and areas including tropical peatlands and riparian reserves globally.

Integrating climate impact reduction within RSPO Independent Smallholder certification

Globally, RSPO’s smallholder certification footprint has grown significantly. As of 2023, over 40,000 individual independent smallholders have been certified globally, up 11,268 from 2022, with certification now expanded to Colombia, Ecuador and Honduras.

Recognising the critical role that smallholders can play in the reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions derived from palm oil production, RSPO signed an MoU with Global Green Chemicals Public Company Limited (GGC) and the German sustainable development entity, GIZ. The MoU will integrate climate impact reduction within RSPO Certification through the Sustainable Palm Oil Production and Procurement Project on Climate Mitigation and Adaptation (SPOPP CLIMA), funded by GGC, a leading company in Thailand committed to achieving carbon neutrality.

The partnership aims to promote low-carbon farming practices and includes the development of a carbon footprint calculation tool for fresh fruit bunches to measure emissions and eventually develop reduction strategies, in line with guidelines from the Thailand Greenhouse Gas Management Organisation (TGO). 

Mr. Kridsada Prasertsuko, Managing Director, Global Green Chemical PCL commented, “GGC has worked with GIZ and RSPO to support our oil palm smallholders in reducing carbon emissions and carbon footprints. Together, our goal is to achieve 20% carbon emission reduction by Year 2030 and achieve Net Zero by Year 2050, together with promoting sustainable oil palm production in accordance with the European Union Deforestation-free Regulations (EUDR), effective on 1 January 2025. This cooperation will not only reduce climate impact on the agricultural sector but also enhance sustainability to the oil palm industry and promote the image of the Thai oil palm industry in the global market.”

Additionally, the project will create a training curriculum on carbon footprint calculation for farmers and establish demonstration plots to showcase suitable low-carbon farming practices.

Since 2015, cumulative GHG emissions (~2 million MT CO2e) avoided through the implementation of RSPO Standards is equal to 468,864 passenger vehicles driven over a year.

Observing the MoU, Dr. Taworn Thunjai, Inspector-General of the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives who delivered remarks on behalf of Her Excellency Prof. Dr. Narumon Pinyosinwat, Thailand’s Minister of Agriculture and Cooperatives, recognised the RSPO’s role in supporting smallholder farmers, who play a vital role in Thailand’s palm oil sector. In the five years since the last Roundtable Conference was held in Thailand, the country has fortified its position as the world’s third-largest palm oil producer. Today, smallholders from 400,000 households in Thailand account for 85% of Thailand’s palm oil production area. Thailand has the highest percentage of RSPO certified independent smallholders who are women, 42%, compared to the global average of 28%.

Growth in RSPO Certification continues to drive supply and consumption

As of 2023, RSPO Certified oil palm area spans 5.2 million ha across 23 countries. Midstream and downstream facilities certified under the RSPO Supply Chain Certification (SCC) Standard stand at 6,907 sites worldwide.

CSPO supply reached a new milestone at 16.1 million MT, representing a 4.3% growth in production year-on-year, while CSPO consumption grew to 9.8 million MT, representing a 7.2% increase in downstream usage year-on-year. Consumption growth was supported by the RSPO Shared Responsibility (SR) Framework, designed to support members in compliance reporting as it requires having in place relevant policies and plans, and a commitment to meet yearly uptake targets. More than half of applicable processors and traders, consumer goods manufacturers, and retailer members met their 2023 CSPO SR uptake targets. To support independent smallholders (ISH), RSPO downstream members bought 261,792 ISH Credits worth US$7.0 million in 2023 (up by US$1.53 million from 2022) directly benefiting 85 certified ISH groups.

Downstream players from China, the world’s second-largest palm oil importer, featured prominently at RT2024. In recent years, emerging policies in China have been steering suppliers towards sustainable palm oil sourcing practices, giving rise to a demand for more sustainable palm oil products in the Chinese market. In November, one of the world’s top five dairy companies, Inner Mongolia Yili Industrial Group (Yili Group), and Yihai Kerry, the leading palm oil trader in China spearheaded the very first shipment of RSPO CSPO into the country. The first tranche involves 750 tonnes of CSPO, certified under the Identity Preserved (IP) supply chain model, which maintains a single identifiable certified source that is kept separate from ordinary palm oil throughout the supply chain.

Further sealing its commitment to sourcing CSPO products into China, at RT2024, Yili Group signed an additional sustainable sourcing agreement with Yihai Kerry, and a further two with major international traders, Bunge and Cargill, demonstrating its ambition to build a global green value chain for palm oil.

The conference also featured the RSPO Excellence Awards, which saw fifteen RSPO Members nominated for their outstanding contributions to sustainable palm oil. The winners were World Association of Zoos and Accreditation for Innovation; Hacienda La Cabaña S.A for Conservation Leadership; Sustainable Palm OIl Production (ThaChana-Chaiya) Community Enterprise for Smallholder Impact; Ferrero Trading Luxembourg S.A and Chester Zoo for Communicating for Good, and Proctor and Gamble for Shared Responsibility. Learn more about the winners, nominees and their award-worthy initiatives here. For further information on our work and impacts, view the RSPO Impact highlights here.

About RSPO:

The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) is a global partnership to make palm oil sustainable. Formed in 2004, the RSPO is a multi-stakeholder non-profit organisation that unites members from across the palm oil value chain, including oil palm producers, palm oil processors and traders, consumer goods manufacturers, retailers, banks and investors, environmental or nature conservation non-governmental organisations (NGOs), and social or developmental NGOs.

As a partnership for progress and positive impact, the RSPO facilitates global change to make the production and consumption of palm oil sustainable. To inspire change, we communicate the environmental and social benefits. To make progress, we catalyse collaboration. To provide assurance, we set the standards of certification.

The RSPO is registered as an international association in Zurich, Switzerland, with main offices in Malaysia and Indonesia, and offices in China, Colombia, Netherlands, United Kingdom and the United States.

For further information, kindly contact:  [email protected].