Malaysia Palm Oil Industry: Sustainable Practice In recent years, palm oil industry has become one of the

key contributing sectors to Malaysia economy. It currently accounts to approximately 8% or RM53 billion of the Malaysian Gross National Income (GNI) per capita. Malaysian Palm Oil Board (MPOB) studies show that more than 5 million hectares or almost 17% of the nations land mass is cultivated with oil palm. Further, MPOBs statistics also indicates that the oil palm plantations have observed a constant growth of approximately 5% per annum in the recent years. The continuous expansion the oil palm plantation together with the negative image portrayed by international NGOs and the surge in global demand for palm oil have subsequently led to implementation of sustainable practice in the palm oil sector. Lately, many negative campaigns have been launched especially by international NGOs to create bad reputations on palm oil industry which has caused some misunderstanding among the consumers. Several calls have been made in the recent years to boycott palm oil in many European countries. However, positive and sustainable agricultural and palm oil milling such Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), Malaysian Palm Oil Wildlife Conversation Fund (MPOWCF) and Malaysian Palm Oil Code of Practice (CoPs) have been adopted by government, international certification bodies and the industry players. It is believe that such sustainable adaptation would be able to counter the negative image which has been associated with the palm oil industry. The sustainable adaptations listed above such as RSPO and CoPs are not only focused on environmental responsibility and conservation of natural resources and biodiversity. This is achieved via certification by the relevant bodies such as RSPO and MPOB. The certification requirement stresses on relevant aspects related to palm oil sector such as promoting best practice in upstream and downstream industries, continuous development in the key area of activity and responsible development of new oil palm planting. Lately, European market recognizes RSPO certified oil products and fetches better premium price in comparison to non RSPO certified products. On the other hand, MPOWCF is working on the conservation on biological diversity programmes. The objective of the fund is preservation of rainforest and conservation of unique and rare wildlife. The conservation fund is not solely dependent with government grants but also welcomes contribution from the industrial players and as well as industrial players donations. Currently, MPOWCF is also working along with relevant authorities such as Sabah Wildlife and Sarawak Forest Corporation in the orangutan conservation programmes in Borneo. MPOWCF also takes the main lead in the establishment of Borneo Elephant Wildlife Sanctuary in collaboration with Sabah Wildlife. Similar other programmes have been implemented by the government to counter deforestation. Till to-date the River of Life has replanted more than 300,000 trees in the country. The Malaysian government has ratified the Kyoto Protocol on 4th September 2004. By ratifying the protocol, the nation confirms its commitment to reduce the emission of Greenhouse Gases (GHG). The palm oil industry has been identified as one of the key sectors where green projects from palm waste such biogas to energy and biomass wastes to energy projects are being implemented. This is also in line with government policy to reduce the dependency on

fossil fuel such as the Fifth Fuel Policy under 8th and 9th Malaysia Plan and the current Feed-in Tariff scheme which was implemented in the 10th Malaysia Plan. The implementation of such scheme in the palm oil mills promotes more comprehensive utilization of biomass waste such as empty fruit bunches (EFB) and palm oil mill effluent (POME). This also reduces the carbon foot print of the palm oil industry. Recent research by indicates that the Malaysian palm oil industry only contributes about 0.015% of the total global GHG emission which is very low. However, all the good effort should not be stopped here and relevant action must be taken to promote sustainable palm oil milling practices. Top priority should be always given for continuous development and the conservation of biodiversity programmes and let's hope that the palm oil industry become more sustainable and portray greener image in future.