InfoSAWIT, JAKARTA – In 2004, Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) was established as the response of many countries for palm oil products to be sustainable produced. Within voluntary members that consisted of stakeholders in palm oil supply chains, the non – profit organization is committed to change the industries to be more sustainable. Until now RSPO plays central roles in developing and implement sustainable palm oil standards globally.

To realize the goal, RSPO also developed series of environmental and social criteria that every member should obey and implement to produce certified sustainable palm oil (CSPO). This is about to minimize the negative impacts for environment, wild animals, and local people from palm oil production. RSPO also tries to involve every other stakeholder in palm oil to make sure that the standards available run well.

As multi-stakeholder organization, RSPO represents many parties, such as, producers, processors, traders, consumption goods producers, retailers, banks, investors, and non-government organizations. With thousand members in the world, RSPO operates through the consensus, delivering votes for every stakeholder, and sharing responsibility to protect the available regulations.

Though RSPO has been 20 years, sustainable challenges keep raising particularly for the smallholders. In Indonesia, though CSPO volume keeps increasing, the challenges, such as, closer regulations, European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR), collaboration and cooperation would be always the keys to implement sustainable palm oil practices.

To face the closer regulations, RSPO needs to always reinforce sustainable practices which have been implementing during the past 20 years. How would the cooperation run well when closer regulations keep being published? To know it, dear readers could read in  Fokus Majalah InfoSAWIT, December 2023. (T2)