Nestle to resume crude palm oil purchases from Golden Agri-Resources’ subsidiary

Nestle resumes CPO purchases. Golden Agri-Resources recently announced that Nestle has placed an order to resume palm oil purchases from its subsidiary PT SMART. This after the food giant noted that SMART has managed to make continuous progress towards meeting Nestle's responsible sourcing guidelines, including full traceability across the supply chain as audited by international NGO, The Forest Trust . Recall in Mar 2010, Nestle ceased CPO purchases from SMART due to alleged draining of peat lands and violations of environmental laws. Further allegations by Greenpeace also led other consumer food giants such as Unilever and Burger King to suspend their palm oil purchases from the group.

Further orders depend on continuous progress. Going forward, Nestle adds that further business will depend on the group delivering continuous progress towards meeting the responsible sourcing guidelines and RSPO (Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil) certification. Nevertheless, the group says it views this order as an acknowledgement of its ongoing sustainability commitments and efforts to find solutions to continuously produce palm oil in a sustainable, environmentally and socially responsible manner. We also view the move positively as it means that the group's effort to improve the sustainability of its CPO plantations has borne fruit and this news is a strong endorsement of its "green" progress.

Still looking to do more. And the group is not stopping there - GAR says it has also been working with TFT on the implementation of a Forest Conservation Policy, which aims to ensure that GAR has no deforestation footprint and also seeks to achieve long-term sustainable growth for both GAR and the CPO industry. In addition to FCP, GAR is developing a Yield Improvement Policy to improve its productivity. After gaining entry into RSPO in Apr this year, GAR intends to secure RSPO certification for all its existing units by end 2015; SMART has just gotten its certification on 16 Sep 2011 covering nearly 15k ha and one mill.