Vision of an orangutan seemingly under assault from heavy machinery
in Indonesia went viral on social media last week, briefly putting the
issue of illegal palm oil operations back in the spotlight.
The footage, originally shot in 2014, shows the animal clambering to get away while an excavator pushes the lone tree it is sheltering in to the ground.
The men who can be seen pursuing the animal were from International Animal Rescue (IAR) and the Agency for the Conservation of Natural Resources (BKSDA) and were attempting to sedate and capture the animal before relocating it.
In an attempt to stop scenes like this, the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) set up the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) in 2004, with industry partners and social-environmental organisations.
And in 2011 the RSPO trademark was launched as a way to certify products containing sustainably grown palm oil.
Today, many of the biggest producers of things such as chocolate, shampoo, chips, household cleaning products, cosmetics, and even pet foods are members of RSPO and claim their palm oil comes from sustainable sources.
It is often difficult to tell which products contain palm oil though, because Australian guidelines allow more generic terms like "vegetable oil" or "vegetable fat" to be listed on product packaging instead.
And palm oil is the most widely used "vegetable oil" in the world.
Many have criticised RSPO, saying it provides cover for corporate palm oil stakeholders to carry on with business as usual.
In March, Greenpeace released a report naming companies which refused to publish the producers and mills they source their palm oil from, including RSPO members Pepsico, Johnson & Johnson, and Kraft-Heinz.
And now new research published in Environmental Research Letters has cast doubt on whether RSPO certification is achieving real improvements in the sustainability of palm oil production.
"We found no significant evidence to suggest RSPO was better in achieving any of those metrics compared to non-certified plantations," Ms Morgans said.
The researchers found orangutan populations declined at similar rates between RSPO-certified and non-certified plantations between 2009 and 2014.
They also found that outbreaks of fire increased at similar rates between both, and that poverty increased while access to healthcare per capita decreased in villages neighbouring certified and non-certified plantations.
The study did, however, find that the poverty increase and the decrease in access to healthcare progressed slower in proximity to RSPO-certified regions.
RSPO's "vague" terminology and criteria, and minimal punishment for companies that breach guidelines, is partly to blame for the system's poor performance, according to Ms Morgans.
"It asks for 'populations to be maintained' with no real baselines or baseline indicators," she said.
"There's no baseline data [on threatened species] collected, so it's difficult to distinguish if a population is being maintained or not, if we don't really know what the populations were to begin with."
Around 100,000 orangutan were lost in Borneo between 1999 and 2015 due mainly to hunting and habitat clearing, according to a study earlier this year.
Firstly, he said that while the organisation's steering committee is comprised of equal parts environmental groups, social advocacy groups and industry, the body of the RSPO is industry driven.
While environmental and social groups have been pulling one way, industry has been pulling the other, he said.
"A very big part of that was very strong efforts, and successful efforts by almost all the big palm oil producers, to undercut any kind of labelling of palm oil on products," Professor Laurence said.
Because of a lack of labelling transparency there is no way for consumers to prioritise RSPO-certified palm oil, Professor Laurence said.
This in turn means that certified sustainable palm oil has no competitive advantage in the marketplace.
"The point of producing this environmentally more benign product is that producers are going to get paid more for it; there's a carrot there at the end," he said.
Finally, Professor Laurence said, the world's largest consumers of palm oil, China and India, have shown little interest in signing up to the scheme.
The research by Ms Morgans and her colleagues used SKTM letters — a letter issued in Indonesia which states a person is poor — to determine poverty rates, which Mr Savi questioned as a "reliable sole indicator" of poverty.
He also pointed to other research which suggested that RSPO had been effective in reducing forest loss and fire in certified plantations.
However, he conceded a previous study had also found orangutan loss rates were about 2.2 per cent per year in both plantations, regardless of certification.
He suggested more research was needed.
Despite their misgivings about the effectiveness of RSPO in achieving sustainable outcomes, neither Ms Morgans or Professor Laurence advocate getting rid of the scheme.
Palm oil is an economically important industry that provides employment in regions where there are few other alternatives for income.
The RSPO General Assembly will decide on changes to its principles and criteria in November, and Ms Morgans said better defined and enforced criteria could achieve better results.
"Although RSPO is not achieving quite what we want, it is still better than nothing at all, and it is also still the best mechanism that we have to enable these concessions to do better," she said.
"I think we've got an evaluation now that says what we've tried isn't good enough and we need to reform this and make it better."
RSPO-member companies could start by supporting the specific labelling of palm oil in product ingredients, according to Professor Laurance.
"It's been like the cigarette producers have fought the scary photos on the packaging, and they say 'it won't make any difference'. Well why were they fighting it so hard?"
The footage, originally shot in 2014, shows the animal clambering to get away while an excavator pushes the lone tree it is sheltering in to the ground.
The men who can be seen pursuing the animal were from International Animal Rescue (IAR) and the Agency for the Conservation of Natural Resources (BKSDA) and were attempting to sedate and capture the animal before relocating it.
In an attempt to stop scenes like this, the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) set up the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) in 2004, with industry partners and social-environmental organisations.
And in 2011 the RSPO trademark was launched as a way to certify products containing sustainably grown palm oil.
Today, many of the biggest producers of things such as chocolate, shampoo, chips, household cleaning products, cosmetics, and even pet foods are members of RSPO and claim their palm oil comes from sustainable sources.
It is often difficult to tell which products contain palm oil though, because Australian guidelines allow more generic terms like "vegetable oil" or "vegetable fat" to be listed on product packaging instead.
And palm oil is the most widely used "vegetable oil" in the world.
Many have criticised RSPO, saying it provides cover for corporate palm oil stakeholders to carry on with business as usual.
In March, Greenpeace released a report naming companies which refused to publish the producers and mills they source their palm oil from, including RSPO members Pepsico, Johnson & Johnson, and Kraft-Heinz.
And now new research published in Environmental Research Letters has cast doubt on whether RSPO certification is achieving real improvements in the sustainability of palm oil production.
'No difference' in orangutan decline
Environmental, social and economic performance between certified and non-certified plantations in Indonesian Borneo were compared by University of Queensland (UQ) researchers, including lead author Courtney Morgans.
"We found no significant evidence to suggest RSPO was better in achieving any of those metrics compared to non-certified plantations," Ms Morgans said.
The researchers found orangutan populations declined at similar rates between RSPO-certified and non-certified plantations between 2009 and 2014.
They also found that outbreaks of fire increased at similar rates between both, and that poverty increased while access to healthcare per capita decreased in villages neighbouring certified and non-certified plantations.
The study did, however, find that the poverty increase and the decrease in access to healthcare progressed slower in proximity to RSPO-certified regions.
RSPO's "vague" terminology and criteria, and minimal punishment for companies that breach guidelines, is partly to blame for the system's poor performance, according to Ms Morgans.
"It asks for 'populations to be maintained' with no real baselines or baseline indicators," she said.
"There's no baseline data [on threatened species] collected, so it's difficult to distinguish if a population is being maintained or not, if we don't really know what the populations were to begin with."
Around 100,000 orangutan were lost in Borneo between 1999 and 2015 due mainly to hunting and habitat clearing, according to a study earlier this year.
Industry fought like 'absolute demons'
There are three reasons why the RSPO is failing to achieve its sustainability goals, according to Bill Laurence from James Cook University, who was not involved in the study by Ms Morgans.
Firstly, he said that while the organisation's steering committee is comprised of equal parts environmental groups, social advocacy groups and industry, the body of the RSPO is industry driven.
While environmental and social groups have been pulling one way, industry has been pulling the other, he said.
"A very big part of that was very strong efforts, and successful efforts by almost all the big palm oil producers, to undercut any kind of labelling of palm oil on products," Professor Laurence said.
Because of a lack of labelling transparency there is no way for consumers to prioritise RSPO-certified palm oil, Professor Laurence said.
This in turn means that certified sustainable palm oil has no competitive advantage in the marketplace.
"The point of producing this environmentally more benign product is that producers are going to get paid more for it; there's a carrot there at the end," he said.
Finally, Professor Laurence said, the world's largest consumers of palm oil, China and India, have shown little interest in signing up to the scheme.
Is there such a thing as sustainable palm oil?
RSPO spokesperson Stefano Savi rejected the suggestion the organisation is not making headway in its efforts towards a sustainable industry.
The research by Ms Morgans and her colleagues used SKTM letters — a letter issued in Indonesia which states a person is poor — to determine poverty rates, which Mr Savi questioned as a "reliable sole indicator" of poverty.
He also pointed to other research which suggested that RSPO had been effective in reducing forest loss and fire in certified plantations.
However, he conceded a previous study had also found orangutan loss rates were about 2.2 per cent per year in both plantations, regardless of certification.
He suggested more research was needed.
Despite their misgivings about the effectiveness of RSPO in achieving sustainable outcomes, neither Ms Morgans or Professor Laurence advocate getting rid of the scheme.
Palm oil is an economically important industry that provides employment in regions where there are few other alternatives for income.
The RSPO General Assembly will decide on changes to its principles and criteria in November, and Ms Morgans said better defined and enforced criteria could achieve better results.
"Although RSPO is not achieving quite what we want, it is still better than nothing at all, and it is also still the best mechanism that we have to enable these concessions to do better," she said.
"I think we've got an evaluation now that says what we've tried isn't good enough and we need to reform this and make it better."
RSPO-member companies could start by supporting the specific labelling of palm oil in product ingredients, according to Professor Laurance.
"It's been like the cigarette producers have fought the scary photos on the packaging, and they say 'it won't make any difference'. Well why were they fighting it so hard?"
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