Verification over forest destruction claims to be completed in June

Mustaqim Adamrah, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Wed, 04/07/2010 8:22 PM

Publicly listed crude palm oil (CPO) producer PT Sinar Mas Agro Resources and Technology (SMART) expects to have a verification work over forest destruction claims finished by June’s end.

“We have delivered the term of reference (part of the verification work) to the two consulting (firms) … we still need to arrange some details,” SMART president Daud Dharsono told reporters on Wednesday after a meeting with Trade Ministry officials and the Netherlands-based consumer goods producer Unilever executives.

“We hope the verification will complete within the next eight to 12 weeks – by the end of June.”

For the verification, SMART has appointed the Netherlands-based Control Union Certification (CUC) and British Standards Institute Group (BSI) headquartered in London through their representative offices in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and in Singapore, respectively.

Results of the verification are expected to, as SMART says, “clarify” issues raised by environmental non-governmental organization Greenpeace in the latter’s report.

Meanwhile, Unilever Indonesia corporate secretary Sancoyo Antarikso said Unilever would wait for the results before deciding to whether resume buying CPO from SMART or not.

In a 2008 Greenpeace report, the organization indicated that CPO producers, including SMART, had converted peat lands, natural forests and habitats of Indonesia’s indigenous Orangutan into oil palm plantations. The report was later supported by a field investigation and satellite data.

Palm oil can be found in half of all the best-selling foods in the world

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