Efforts by Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore to "green" the palm oil supply chain have gathered momentum despite some hiccups. The question is whether the outcome will be in time to make a difference for the world.
With evidence of global warming and threats to biodiversity mounting by the day, reducing the heavy environmental impact of palm oil cultivation can't happen too soon. But the European Parliament seems to run out of patience. On April its members requested the European Union to "introduce a single certification scheme for palm oil entering the EU market and phase out the use of vegetable oils that drive deforestation by 2020".
Members of European Parliament acknowledged that there are already various voluntary certification schemes initiated by producers and related parties to promote the sustainable cultivation of oil palm fruit. "However, their standards are open to criticism and are confusing for consumers," said a report published on the European Parliament News website.
The European parliamentarians' stance has upset many players in Southeast Asia, especially ministers in Malaysia and Indonesia who have been working with the industry to improve practices. They view efforts to create an EU certification scheme for palm oil as a trade barrier and discriminatory.
Simon Tay, chairman of the Singapore Institute of International Affairs (SIIA), expressed concern that the EU creating its own certification could have the unintended effect of moving away from collaboration and cooperation, which is essential for tackling an issue as complex as palm oil, and devolving into a game of finger-pointing.
"The negative reaction so far from Indonesia and Malaysia suggests this and it is unclear how an EU-driven certification would now be able to monitor supply chains and identify issues or violations more effectively than existing certification schemes, given the absence of buy-in from the major stakeholder countries and the short three-year time frame with which it aims to implement its certification," he said.
Denys Collin Munang, chief international business officer of Felda Global Ventures Holding Berhad (FGVH), the Malaysian agribusiness giant, said the EU move would be unfair as other agricultural products are not subjected to such tough sustainability requirements.
Quoting the United States Department of Agriculture, Mr Munang said oil palm plantations only occupied 5.5% or 18 million hectares out of 260 million hectares of land used for edible plant-oil harvesting. "The question is, what about the other 94.5%?" he asked rhetorically.
"Furthermore, 40% of world palm oil is produced by smallholders who already have difficulty complying with formal certification requirements. Why is the European Parliament trying to marginalise these smallholders?" asked Mr Munang, who is also on the board of governors of the Roundtable for Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO).
Bangkok-based grassroots conservationist and agricultural expert Witoon Lienchamroon, of Biothai, which monitors biodiversity and the impact of large plantations on the environment, acknowledged that the initiatives taken by the RSPO were far from perfect. For example, application of the ban on pesticides such as paraquat has been inconsistent, and varies with the readiness of individual members.
"But the best part of the RSPO standard is that it includes community and civil society participation, it gives weight to locally based people, local authorities and communities in participation," said Mr Witoon.
"It might not be perfect, but it should be given much more time to improve."
