RSPO’s next frontier: Scaling sustainable palm oil in Asia’s emerging markets

The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) was founded two decades ago with big aspirations to end deforestation and promote ethical sourcing within the palm oil industry, which as a commodity is the third-largest driver of forest loss, after beef and soy, and has historically been linked to human rights abuses.

Started by a group consisting of the World Wildlife Foundation, the Malaysian Palm Oil Association and multinationals like Unilever, vegetable oil and fats producer AAK and retailer Migros, the organisation now counts over 6,000 palm oil growers, buyers, investors and non-governmental organisations among its members.

Since the world’s first shipment of RSPO-certified barrels in 2008, over 16 million metric tonnes (MT) of palm oil – representing about a fifth of global production – have been given its stamp of approval, with consumption mostly driven by demand in Europe and North America.

As these markets mature, RSPO has started looking to new markets to bolster uptake of certified sustainable palm oil, especially with the growth of RSPO-certified palm oil as a proportion of global output plateauing in recent years.

However, despite efforts to boost the uptake of sustainable palm oil in new markets like China and India – the world’s top two importers of the commodity – only 9 per cent and 3 per cent of palm oil entering these markets, respectively, have been certified under RSPO’s scheme.

RSPO’s chief executive Joseph D’Cruz acknowledged that the market for sustainable palm oil in Europe is “very much at a saturation point.” “If you look at the volumes right now, it’s public knowledge that we are not having a lot more upside,” he told Eco-Business.

Over 90 per cent of the European Union’s imported palm oil – a ubiquitous ingredient in everyday products, from cereal to shampoo – are now RSPO-certified.

D’Cruz said there is room to improve the quality of sustainable palm oil imports into the EU as about a fifth of the certified volumes still rely on RSPO credits to offset non-certified palm oil that gets mixed in throughout the supply chain, instead of being fully segregated and traceable.

“That’s what we are working on a lot, especially with the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR), which actually makes the case for us to move into the segregated market,” he said.

Under the EUDR, which requires full physical traceability of the palm oil supply chain, RSPO credits which represent a tonne of fresh fruit bunches – the raw material for palm oil – produced by certified smallholders will not be recognised.

In the United States, D’Cruz foresees a potential lift in sustainable palm oil uptake, especially as big multinationals, like Amazon, come on board as members and engage with RSPO to improve their sourcing policies.

While volumes have not yet gone up in emerging markets like India and China, he said that RSPO is “definitely seeing a very strong interest”.

Last month, China’s largest dairy producer Yili partnered Yihai Kerry, the country’s top palm oil trader and a subsidiary of palm oil behemoth Wilmar International, to bring in the nation’s first shipment of sustainable palm oil from a single identifiable RSPO-certified source, termed as Identity Preserved (IP).

The initial batch of 750 tonnes, which was kept separate from conventional palm oil throughout the supply chain, will be used in Yili’s ice cream production. The company utilised 35,000 tonnes of the commodity in 2023, of which 360 tonnes were certified partially through the use of RSPO credits.

At its annual roundtable conference in November last year, RSPO shared its observations that certified sustainable palm oil uptake is growing steadily in China, where it now makes up about 9 per cent of the total palm oil consumed, as well as in Malaysia and Latin America. There needs to be faster growth in demand beyond mature markets, it said.

Price sensitivities have been a key limiting factor for the uptake of RSPO-certified palm oil in emerging markets where sustainable palm oil is generally more expensive than conventional palm oil. RSPO acknowledged this at the conference last year, where it stated that price sensitivities in India might limit uptake growth of certified sustainable palm oil, though actual volumes are still rising at the moment.

Prapin Lawanprasert, manager of the sourcing department for Thai President Foods, the country’s largest producer of instant noodles, who spoke at the RSPO’s annual roundtable summit last month, said that the use of sustainable palm oil in its products “should not affect the price too much”, given that locals expect basic foodstuffs like instant noodles to be “very cheap”.

As a result, Lawanprasert said that the demand for sustainable palm oil in its products is currently driven by its export market, mostly in Europe. Within the Thai market, sustainable palm oil only accounts for 1 per cent of the business’ raw materials, she added.

Echoing Lawanprasert’s sentiments, Amitt Chhabra, head of institutional sales at India’s largest fast-moving consumer goods company Patanjali Foods Limited, observed that uptake is currently driven by sustainable palm oil price trends in emerging markets, where it becomes easier to convince brands to use it in their products when prices are lower.

But given the price volatility in markets, enduring demand will have to come from domestic consumers who understand that “sustainability is a must for society,” said Chhabra.

“Many international brands are opening up their stores in India, so they always talk about sustainable palm oil,” said Chabara. “It has always been the case that when the first 10 per cent of people adopt something, the rest will follow. So while we are supplying them, we are also encouraging domestic brands to adopt sustainable palm oil, and we have seen satisfactory results.”

D’Cruz said that RSPO has not set targets for sustainable palm oil uptake in China and India, given the complexity of doing so.

“Our role is not necessarily to market a subset of products. It is to convince the entire industry to become more sustainable,” said D’Cruz. “Now, is that going to result in 80 per cent of India’s source products becoming RSPO-certified? I don’t know. Maybe not, but that’s not the number one objective of our work. Our objective is to convince them that it’s in their interest to become more sustainable, and that conversation is happening.”

D’Cruz said RSPO will need to double down efforts in large producer markets which are also large consumption markets, like Indonesia and Malaysia. At the same time, he recognised that significant change to “lift the overall market” in these countries will only be brought about by having national standards in place. This will then give RSPO the space to further engage those who want to use its standards, said D’Cruz.

In Indonesia, for instance, D’Cruz shared that RSPO has been working with the provincial government to obtain Indonesian Sustainable Palm Oil (ISPO) certification – which will become mandatory for all domestic oil palm growers and millers come 2025 – for smallholders in Jambi.

“We are supporting this work to get them ISPO-certified because it gets them on the pathway. Then moving beyond that, if they are willing and able to get RSPO-certified, by all means. But we are not focused single-mindedly on certification as a tool, because our objective is the sustainability of the industry.”

As for whether he expects RSPO-certified palm oil as a proportion of global volumes to push past the 20 per cent figure, D’Cruz said that the body is not chasing for a 100 per cent certification rate.

“If we are constantly maintaining RSPO as the gold standard, almost by logic and definition, we are never going to be at 100 per cent of the market, because that gives us the space to continue to be innovators and test out how to move the needle in terms of sustainability,” he said.

Tags: markets, China, Production, India, palm oil, deforestation, RSPO, Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil, EUDR, Malaysian Palm Oil Association, EU Deforestation Regulation