Written by: Robert Hii, Founder of CSPO Watch.

The palm oil industry globally has long been targeted as an industry that contributes to climate change. As a popular scapegoat for climate change, every process in producing palm oil is scrutinized like no other product in the world.
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Attention on the environmental impact of vegetable oils like soy or canola which have a much larger land footprint are mere hiccups in the media when compared to palm oil. The palm oil industry’s arguments that it has contributed much to the development of third world countries falls on deaf ears when visuals like orangutans question its sustainability.

Despite the negative media, the consumption of palm oil globally has grown in past decades. This has provided yet more fuel and funding for anti-palm oil camps as they scrutinize every aspect of its production for negative talking points.

From the planting of seedlings to its processing at mills, palm oil has the unenviable position of being the target of prying eyes looking to demonize the crop further.

If there were to be a silver lining to all this attention, it has to be that it has inadvertently created guidelines for the palm oil industry to show how it is the most sustainable vegetable oil.

As the global urgency to fight climate change ratchets up, the palm oil industry in Malaysia is using the same criticisms to forge a path towards a net zero vegetable oil. This would turn the vegetable oils market on its ears if the industry succeeds.

Before getting into how Malaysian industry plans to achieve net zero emissions, its important to understand what net zero means. The term is used loosely with “carbon neutral” as The Conversation explains in this article. In short:

“There are a few key ways to move to net-zero emissions, which are reflected in most national plans:

• drastically reduce or eliminate the use of fossil fuels in the energy sector (including transport)
• improve efficiency and/or develop new technology in other sectors generating emissions but unable to easily reduce them, such as manufacturing and agriculture
• invest in bio-sequestration (also known as reforestation or tree-planting) and carbon-negative technologies to offset any continuing or unavoidable emissions.

Achieving only the first two points would not take the world to net-zero. Carbon-negative approaches – removing CO₂ from the atmosphere – will also be needed.”

The targets for the Malaysian palm oil industry would therefore include reducing its use of fossil fuels, improve efficiency in operations from field to factory AND to make a meaningful impact, bio-sequestration or reforestation to absorb unavoidable emissions.

Specifically for the palm oil industry, a key action should be the reduction or elimination of deforestation. Failure to do this would only lump any net zero efforts in the same basket as other industries which seek to continue business-as-usual as Greenpeace explains.

The commitment of the Malaysian governments at federal and state levels towards a no-deforestation palm oil must be maintained for the net zero targets to work. Assuming that the commitment stays in place, how should the Malaysian palm oil industry work towards a net zero goal?

Science and Technology In The Drive Towards Net Zero

Unsurprisingly it is science and new technology that is driving Malaysia’s push towards net zero. Mind you the palm oil industry has an advantage over other vegetable oil crops since it is a perennial crop as opposed to annual crops like soy or canola. As a vegetable oil with the honor of being the most certified globally, it has another distinct achievement in protecting more natural habitat within in-situ operations thanks to certification schemes like the RSPO and national schemes in MSPO and ISPO.

However, in order to achieve a net zero ambition, it will have to prove that these ambitions are not only physically possible but economically viable.

Research and development by the Malaysian Palm Oil Board in the past few decades has seen multiple inventions in high yielding trees, mechanization of farm processes and most recently, new technology that uses farm wastes to deliver two environmental benefits in cleaning waste water while creating a source of fertilizer. This is a remarkable achievement in circular economy where a pollutant becomes a key element in regenerative agriculture when it nourishes future harvests.

On top of industry led initiatives towards net zero palm oil, Malaysian scientists and academicians have stood out prominently. Ir Qua Kiat Seng, a senior lecturer at Monash University and prominent expert on palm oil laid out Malaysia’s net zero potential in an article“When Malaysia embraces net-zero carbon emissions, what does it mean for the palm oil industry in Malaysia?”

He is a fellow of Monash-Industry Palm Oil Education and Research (MIPO) Platform and a member of the working group for the review of MSPO Standards whose work is expected to influence the new standards for Malaysian palm oil. At a recent webinar, he underlined the potential of palm bioenergy to contribute towards achieving net zero or net-negative carbon.

Fellow engineer Ir Hong Wai Onn who co-founded Palm Oil Processing Special Interest Group with Ir Qua Kiat Seng within the Institution of Chemical Engineers (IChemE) adds his expertise for more solutions. As a Technical Service Advisor to the global solution provider Novozymes, his expertise on the use of enzymes to reduce the environmental impact of palm oil mills supports his belief that Malaysian palm oil can now rebrand its sustainability story as a net-zero transition is not just possible but immediately achievable.

The urgency for the implementation of their findings finds support in the IPCC Working Group 1 Report which has been labelled as code red for humanity.

Engineers like Qua Kiat Seng and Hong Wai Onn are two of the many experts who are laying the foundation for Malaysia and its palm oil industry to achieve net zero status. Their work may not provide content for a viral news blast but the solutions are a practical down-to-earth pathway towards sustainability.

In the words of Basile van Havre, co-chair of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) working group responsible for drafting a Paris-style UN agreement on biodiversity loss:

“Change is coming [in food production]. There will be a lot more of us in 10 years and they will need to be fed so it’s not about decreasing the level of activity. It’s about increasing the output and doing better for nature."