Anita Neville spoke with AgTechNavigator editor-in-chief Gary Scattergood at the recent Asia-Pacific Agri-Food Innovation Summit held in Singapore.
Few sectors in South East Asia have been under the spotlight over their traceability and sustainability efforts as the palm oil industry.
In our video conversation, Neville explained how GAR, which manages 532,000 hectares of palm oil estate in Indonesia, had initially committed to achieving traceability to the mill level after ‘endless NGO reports’ claiming deforestation activities among its suppliers.
It then went a step further, with GAR-owned mills achieving 100% traceability to plantation (TTP) at the end of 2017, and is working closely with third-party supplier mills to achieve the same result. As of end 2023, GAR achieved 99% full TTP for the palm supply chain.
Furthermore, the traceability drive has generated a huge amount of data, and Neville is excited about what more this could be used for, especially in driving investment to reduce carbon emissions, GHGs and meeting Scope 3 reduction targets.
In the video, Neville also reflects on the impact of the European Deforestation Regulation (EUDR), the implementation of which was recently delayed until the end of 2025.
And she also shares her views on the new technology, partnerships and collaborations the company is looking for, and the importance of local knowledge, practicality and smallholder adoption when it comes to innovation.
This is particularly pertinent as 40% of the company’s suppliers are smallholders.
“I’m always wary when people come to me with a product from Silicon Valley, or the European equivalent, and I say to them ‘have you ever had to stand on a table in a field [in Indonesia]…to get a single bar of signal to send a whatsapp message?’”
Watch the video for more.
