The Palm Pod
Planting the seeds of change, one pod at a time. Join us at The Palm Pod for engaging discussions, expert insights, and industry updates on sustainable palm oil, guiding consumers and businesses to make better choices for the people, planet and prosperity. This podcast is brought to you by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) - a global partnership to make palm oil sustainable.
The Palm Pod
Episode 17 - Is Jurisdictional Approach just another RSPO Standards?
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Oftentimes, when discussing the responsibility in ensuring sustainability practices, it always points at a business entity, an institution, specific stakeholders or perhaps an individual.
But, what if the future of sustainability didn’t depend on one company or one farmer doing the right thing, but an entire place deciding to do it together?
RSPO Jurisdictional Approach aims to address just that.
Join our host, Fara Rom and our guest speaker Daniel Liew, Manager, Standard Design & Innovation (Jurisdictional Approach) from Standard and Sustainability Division, RSPO to take us step-by-step about the game changing initiative in driving sustainable palm oil collectively.
Listen in to know what RSPO’s Jurisdictional Approach or JA, is all about.
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Access JA Fact Sheet here.
Learn more about sustainable palm oil at www.rspo.org.
*The views and opinions expressed on The Palm Pod are solely those of the speaker and do not necessarily reflect those of The Palm Pod or the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO).
You are now listening to the palm pot, brought to you by RSPO, a global partnership to make palm oil sustainable. Hi, I'm Farah Room, and you're tuning into the Palm Pot where we host engaging discussions, expert insights, and industry updates on sustainable palm oil, guiding consumers and businesses to make better choices for the planet. So most sustainability efforts in palm oil focuses on individual plantations or companies. Usually it's one farm gets certified or one meal improves its practices. But let's imagine, what if instead of changing things one company at a time, we work to transform an entire state or even an entire country? And what if government agencies, companies, smallholders, civil society groups, and local communities all work together under one shared sustainability plan? So in today's episode, we are breaking down what the RSPO jurisdictional approach or JA actually means and why it was created and how it aims to scale up sustainable palm oil in a way that's more coordinated, inclusive, and long-lasting. So today I'm joined by Daniel Liu, manager for Standard Design and Innovation or Jurisdictional Approach from Standard and Sustainability Division in RSVO, who has been closely involved in this work. Thank you so much for being here, Daniel.
SPEAKER_00Hi, thanks. Good to be here. Thanks for around.
SPEAKER_01Before we get into the business of JA, can you share your role and what it entails?
SPEAKER_00Sure. Hi, my name is Daniel. I've worked in the Standard and Sustainability Division, supporting the standard review and implementing process. But my main responsibility is to work on implementation of JA, developing the technical guidance and supporting the JA pilots. I have also worked with partners like the GEF HORU program, the World Bank, and Innovation Forum in promoting the concept of RSPOJA.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so of course we want to know what this is all about. Daniel, in simple terms, explain to the audience what is the RSPO jurisdictional approach or J.
SPEAKER_00Sure, Farad. Jurisdictional approach in simple terms is actually quite similar to the conventional approach, only that at jurisdictional approach, we work with more stakeholders. We work all the multi-stakeholders in a jurisdiction. And also, obviously, it we also work at a larger landscape, larger geographical scale. Instead of just one company and its plantation, we are talking about possibly the state of Sabah or a district or any other different government jurisdiction.
SPEAKER_01Okay, so some people may be hearing about JA for the first time. So is JA actually another form of RSPO standards? How is it different from traditional certification like you mentioned just now?
SPEAKER_00Sure, this is a very good question. Actually, it must be pointed out that JA jurisdictional approach is not a new RSPO standard. It is merely a new certification approach, which is still based on the same RSPO standards like the principle and criteria, the independent smallholder standards, or the supply chain standards, based on the same standard as the conventional management unit certification. It's only different from the conventional approach in its way of complying to the standards indicators.
SPEAKER_01So instead of certifying one company, we're talking about certifying an entire state or district. Is that correct?
SPEAKER_00That is correct.
SPEAKER_01Okay. So how does it translate on the ground? Can you just explain briefly?
SPEAKER_00Okay, before we even go and talk about certification, what it looks like on the how does it translate on the ground? There's a lot of preparatory work that is involved. On the one hand, which ISPO is currently doing, yeah, we are developing the technical guidance for jurisdictional members to be compliant at a jurisdictional scale, to be compliant with important certification requirements like the HCVHCS assessment, the remediation and compensation procedures, the three prior informed consent procedures, what we call FPIC. And as for the jurisdiction that is interested in pursuing JA, they would need to organize themselves in a multi-stakeholder forum, set up a legal entity called Jurisdiction Entity to manage the JA initiative. So the JA basically has to do things like developing the infrastructures for jurisdictional certification, organizing the members, and a lot of preparatory work. In a pilot jurisdiction working towards JA, what it looks like on the ground is also you will see a lot of engagement, a lot of socialization, negotiation activities to organize the global company, the smallholders, the civil societies, and the local and indigenous communities and the local government into a functioning entity that can work towards jurisdiction local.
SPEAKER_01So basically, it's a sort of certification that doesn't just involve an internal discussion between the company itself, but also the area which involves people, government. So everyone has to be talking to each other, right?
SPEAKER_00Yes, very much so. Is it's not that different from RSPO itself, actually. Just people with uh different interests, different commitment sitting together and talking it out, working it out, a solution.
SPEAKER_01Okay, but there's a question. Why did RSPO feel there's a need to introduce this new approach? Does that mean what was introduced before wasn't working, or what kind of problems or challenges does this bigger scale model aim to solve?
SPEAKER_00Sure. I'll take the first point. Uh I'll I'll address the first point. So, how it started in RSPO, this whole push towards jurisdictional approach is really a theory of change exercise that RSPO implemented back in 2018. And within that exercise, the jurisdictional approach was identified as one of the key strategies that would help to achieve RSPO's vision of making sustainable palm oil denom. The idea is that by supporting more people to adopt sustainable practices, that would take us closer to that goal. The focus of support that JA is targeting are the independent smallholders who face limited technical and financial resources. So, again, the idea is by working with multi-stakeholders within the jurisdiction, pulling the resources together that could help to lower the entry barrier for the independent smallholders, thereby getting more people to join the sustainable practices and hopefully achieving the what we call the making sustainable palm oil denom. And about the point of was it something that wasn't working? No, the answer is a very clear no, uh, very much no. Uh JA was not developed to fix a system that was not working, quite the opposite, actually. The conventional certification is working well at management unit level with individual companies or individual farmer groups, and JA was introduced to try to upscale that positive impact over a larger area and involving more stakeholders.
SPEAKER_01Right. So, as you mentioned before, that there are several stakeholders that benefit from this jurisdictional approach, especially smallholders. I'm curious what stage is the jurisdictional approach currently at? And are there any pilot projects already underway?
SPEAKER_00Yes, yes, there are currently three RSPOJA pilots that uh we formally recognize. They are the district of Seruyan in central Kalimantan, Indonesia, the state of Sabah in Malaysia, and of course the country of Ecuador, but they are working still at the district level. So these are the three pilots that we currently have now. And they are at the very stages of progressing towards the jurisdictional certification goal. All of them have been recognized as having commitment from the local government to implement JA and have proper planning in setting up the infrastructure for the jurisdictional certification. Suryan and Saba are well advanced in implementing those plans. Once the infrastructure are in place, the next step would be for them to proceed with the actual audit process at a jurisdictional scale.
SPEAKER_01So this approach involves many different stakeholders. Maybe you can elaborate a bit more on who else needs to be at the table for a jurisdictional approach to work and why does that matter?
SPEAKER_00Okay, good question. Who needs to be at the table? Ideally, I would say everyone. Everyone within a jurisdiction needs to be at the table because if you are working within a jurisdiction, you would want everyone in the jurisdiction who could potentially have something to contribute or will be impacted to be involved and working out a solution. So in JA, we are talking about structural changes that affect everyone within a jurisdiction. Therefore, as I said just now, it is important to ensure that everyone's voice is heard, considered, and form the basis for a collective action plan across the jurisdiction. Of course, uh, the other benefit of having everyone in the jurisdiction to be involved is also that we'll encourage buy-in and commitment by all stakeholders, including most importantly, local government who will lead the whole implementation process.
SPEAKER_01From this conversation that we're having now, there are a lot of emphasis on political wills and the government to take lead. And I feel like this is a positive thing, as imagine the motivation or pressure that you know, companies or other stakeholders like growers can be working together better to make sure that the area that they're existing in and the plantations probably are taken care of, and um, there's more comprehensive overview on how to get certified and make sure that you know the certification process is again a bit more comprehensive compared to individual certification. So, to wrap up our conversation, so what's next for JA? We now understand who needs to be involved and why their participation is so important in making this approach work. Looking ahead, what can we expect from this jurisdictional approach moving forward?
SPEAKER_00What's next in the short term really is that we hope to be able to have uh to have RSPO admitting the first jurisdictional member from a JA pilot very soon, hopefully in the next 12 months. Hopefully, fingers crossed. RSPO and the JA pilots would continue to with the efforts of developing the technical guidance. That's very important because without the technical guidance, the certification, the jurisdictional certification process uh would not be able to proceed. So we will continue with our development of the technical guidance and setting up the jurisdictional certification framework within the next two or three years. And then we also hope to maintain the close cooperation between RSPO and the JA pilots and overcoming the typical JA challenges, such as unfortunately, that's one of the pitfalls of jurisdictional approach, which involves government, is that government changes. And when they change, uh we need to re-engage, we need to re-emphasize or explain again to the incoming government administrative unit that you know why it is good to do JA. So uh there could be a loss of momentum due to the long process. So maintaining the momentum is also important. Uh, lastly, is that the industry, stakeholders, and the general public can expect to hear more about RSPOJA as we expand our efforts of communication and engagement to deliver the message that uh despite the challenges, uh, jurisdictional approach is still a viable option in promoting sustainable agricultural practices across the entire palm oil value chain.
SPEAKER_01That's great. Uh, I have another question. I think this is a very basic question because I've heard some of RSPO members mention this. Is RSPOJ or jurisdictional approach is the same with landscape approach?
SPEAKER_00They are kind of like two sides of a coin because jurisdictional approach by definition is bound by a jurisdiction. We mean the government administrative unit, it could be a state, a district, or a kabubaden, as they call it in Indonesia. So it's bound by government administrative boundaries. And landscape, again, as the name suggests, is defined by according to the landscape where we are looking at. It could be a water catchment area, it could be a patch of forest. Yeah, just things like it. So when I say it's two sides to a coin, what I mean is that in a jurisdictional approach, you could potentially involve different landscapes. And then the other side of it is in a landscape, you could very well be working uh with two or three different government units, two or three different districts, per se.
SPEAKER_01Right. Okay, that's very clear. Thanks so much, Daniel, for helping us unpack the bigger picture of JA.
SPEAKER_00Thank you. Thank you for having me.
SPEAKER_01Thank you, and thank you for showing that meaningful sustainability progress requires collective action across government companies, communities, and other stakeholders. So don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe to the Pompot on your favorite podcasting platform. Feel free to share your feedback for our next episode. I was speaking to our guest, Daniel Yu, Manager Standard Design and Innovation for Jurisdictional Approach from Standard and Sustainability Division RSPO. I am Fararo, and this is the PomPod.