InfoSAWIT, KUALA LUMPUR — Efforts to improve the welfare of small palm oil farmers are once again a focus at the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) 2025 forum. The global organization is exploring the development of a carbon-sequestration payment mechanism that would allow farmers to gain additional income from sustainable cultivation practices.

This move, according to Guntur Prabowo, Head of the RSPO Smallholders Unit, is a promising breakthrough amid the increasing global focus on the green economy and carbon trading. The mechanism would reward farmers who successfully sequester and store carbon dioxide through climate-friendly practices like zero-burning land clearing, soil quality improvement, forest preservation, and palm tree replanting. The verified sequestered carbon would be converted into a carbon credit for every ton of CO₂ equivalent, which could be sold on the global carbon market.

"This is not an easy journey. There is still a lot of complexity related to how the reward scheme and the carbon market itself work," Guntur said, as reported by InfoSAWIT from The Edge Market on Tuesday (4/11/2025).

RSPO is set to sign an MoU with the Asia School of Business (ASB) through the Centre for Sustainable Small-owners (CSS), and the National Association of Smallholders (NASH) to strengthen smallholder resilience through training and sustainable financing access. International civil society organization Solidaridad also supports the economic potential of such mechanisms, noting that incentivizing farmers for carbon sequestration can be an alternative income source and strengthen their contribution to climate change mitigation. (T2)