RSPO Certification Is Green Wash In Africa
Friends of the Earth Africa groups have described the convergence of oil palm plantation companies under the aegis of Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) holding their 3rd Africa Sustainable Palm Oil Conference in Accra, Ghana 20-22 August 2024 as promoters of green wash.
Olam International (“Olam”) has crossed a significant milestone after its first palm plantation went from being the first in Africa to receive the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (“RSPO”) New Planting Procedure verification to also becoming the first-ever new development in Africa to have its working plantation RSPO certified, including the mill.
Sustainable palm oil in Africa: Local solutions to local
Solutions come from understanding the complexity of local context and the discussion on sustainable palm oil in Africa needs to be fact-based and robust. I was tempted to try my hand at providing solutions to solve the many trying issues in Africa and when I looked closely I saw that there is so much to hope for! As with many other
Today, palm oil in Africa accounts for around 70 per cent of edible oil consumption and it’s estimated that up to 22 million hectares of land in West and Central Africa could be converted to oil palm plantations by 2024. The growth and potential for Africa’s sustainable palm oil industry is enduring but like many developing markets, it’s not without its challenges.
Social and environmental impact of palm oil
Palm oil, produced from the oil palm, is a basic source of income for many farmers in South East Asia, Central and West Africa, and Central America.It is locally used as a cooking oil, exported for use in many commercial food and personal care products and is converted into biofuel.
Indonesia, in the process, rose to become the third-largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions. The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), a partnership between stakeholders in the palm oil industry, such as producers, retailers and NGOs, was created over a decade ago to make the industry more environmentally and socially responsible.
Co-producing a Research Agenda for Sustainable Palm Oil
In response, the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) was established in 2004, with the aim of developing and managing a sustainable certification system. Within the last decade the European Union and a variety of private and public sector organizations have initiated policies to encourage the sourcing of sustainable palm oil ( European Parliament, 2014 ; Padfield et al., 2016 ).
RSPO certification for its Mouila Bilala palm oil mill. It brings Olam’s total RSPO certified concession area to 94,000 ha, making it the largest certified producer in Africa with a production capacity of 74,000 MT of certified sustainable palm oil (CSPO) and 13,000 MT of certified sustainable palm kernel oil (CSPKO).
RSPO certification not solution to climate crisis
Friends of the Earth Africa (FoEA) participants attending a two-day strategy meeting on Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) and industrial Plantation expansion in Africa have concluded that
Solidaridad, through its Sustainable West Africa Oil Palm Program (SWAPP), with funding from the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Accra, Ghana, is supporting the National Oil Palm Platform of Liberia (NOPPOL) and the Government of Liberia to actualize the RSPO National Interpretation for Liberia.