Palm oil, power and participation: the political ecology of social impact assessment

The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), as a form of neoliberal environmental governance operating beyond-the-state, seeks to address its democratic deficit and gain legitimacy through deliberative and consultative processes. The RSPO requires companies to conduct participatory Social Impact Assessment (SIA) for both new developments and existing operations in an attempt to identify and address the critical social impacts associated with palm oil production. Using a political ecology framework, and a mixed methods approach, this study explores SIAs as sites of power struggles, to understand the contestations, inequities, and marginalisations that occur in SIA processes. By exploring the nature of SIA as a market-led regime that privileges certain knowledges and politics, and is co-opted and controlled by powerful actors, the paper challenges the notion that SIA can ensure the inclusion of previously marginalised people in decision-making processes. Participation in SIA is found to be, at most, consultative and top-down, and risks the further disempowerment of affected peoples. By viewing SIA as a discrete intervention, without a clear wider political project for social change for local peoples and workers, the RSPO risks “rendering technical” and “marketable” the multifaceted social impacts associated with palm oil production as it simultaneously enacts particular global, neoliberal “participatory” strategies that are applied locally in ways that (re-)produce hegemony and legitimacy

Selling out for sustainability? Neoliberal governance, agency and professional careers in the sustainable palm oil sector

In response to high-profile activist campaigns raising public awareness of the destructive effects of large-scale oil palm plantations on tropical rainforests, wildlife and local communities, the palm oil sector has put considerable effort and resources into ensuring "sustainable", "deforestation-free" palm oil production (and thereby countering negative publicity) over the last 15 years or so. The corporate sustainability drive – with the palm oil sector significantly leading other tropical commodities – has involved the direct employment of many professionals with backgrounds in conservation, anthropology or activism by the private palm oil sector. Based on long term participant observation as well as interviews with "sustainability professionals" about their career choices, this article shows that there is more nuance, agency and positive change than the existing political ecology literature attributes to the sustainable palm oil drive. It also shows how neoliberal governance structures and individual professional careers and values intersect and mutually reinforce each other. This dual, seemingly paradoxical analysis is informed by and situated in the wider context that the sustainability professionals we interviewed and we ourselves, as academics, share: growing academic precarity, the climate and ecological emergency, and the challenges and questions posed by both

Stakeholder perceptions of the environmental effectiveness of multi-stakeholder initiatives: evidence from the palm oil, soy, cotton, and timber programs

The roundtable on sustainable palm oil (RSPO), the round table on responsible soy (RTRS), the better cotton initiative (BCI), and the forest stewardship council (FSC) are examples of multi-stakeholder initiatives (MSIs), established to foster sustainable commodity production. While these programs are promoted as collaborative schemes for natural resource management, the significant gap in understanding of MSIs’ effectiveness presents a major concern over the credibility and legitimacy of such programs. We explore stakeholders’ perceptions of the environmental effectiveness of four MSIs in relation to their impacts in reducing agrochemical use and conserving habitats. We found that stakeholders feel positive about the role of the schemes in advocating environmental sustainability in the commodity sectors, and establishing norms of good practice. However, numerous issues, including the inadequate monitoring and evaluation contribute to perceptions of ineffectiveness and a lack of confidence in the schemes’ ability to drive fundamental transformation in environmental performance

The use of the high conservation value (HCV) and high carbon stock (HCS) approaches by palm oil companies assessed on SPOTT

The High Conservation Value (HCV) and High Carbon Stock (HCS) approaches are used to identify and protect important environmental and social values that should be conserved. This briefing note provides an overview of the commitments to the HCV and HCS approaches made by companies, drawing on SPOTT assessment data from October 2015 to November 2017

Double exposure to capitalist expansion and climatic change: a study of vulnerability on the Ghanaian coastal commodity frontier

Jason Moore's theory of the commodity frontier serves as a useful framework for demonstrating the socio-ecological upheaval that occurs in the 'frontier' spaces to which capitalism must expand in search of uncommodified 'cheap' nature. Work to date however has failed to consider how the impacts of frontier expansion interact with climate change despite the two phenomena being closely linked in both causes and effects, and largely impacting most severely upon rural communities in the Global South. This article seeks to address this gap with a focus on the coastal commodity frontier: socio-ecological systems within which marine and terrestrial frontier expansion can occur concurrently, while being impacted by climatic change. The research was conducted using an ethnographic, case study approach, centred on an eight-month research visit to Aboadze, a small-scale marine fishing community in the Western Region of Ghana. This community is subject to terrestrial frontier expansion in the form of a thermal power station, marine frontier expansion in the form of industrial overfishing, and is also exposed to the impacts of climate change. The article finds, through a double exposure vulnerability framework, that frontier expansion and climatic change interact to exacerbate food, water and livelihood insecurities in the case study community, whilst simultaneously reducing the community's capacity to adapt to its changing environment and perpetuating harmful global changes through feedback exposures. This research makes an important conceptual contribution by galvanising a conversation between two thus far disparate fields and invites further research to provide more nuanced analyses of the intersectional vulnerabilities impacting coastal communities

Unearthing the myths of global sustainable forest governance

Peer reviewe

The SPOTT Index: a proof-of-concept measure for tracking public disclosure in the Palm Oil industry

The production of palm oil has considerable implications for tropical biodiversity. Increasing the environmental, social and governance (ESG) transparency and disclosure of the industry will contribute towards sustainable consumption and production practices. Here, we present a method for producing an index to measure changes in ESG disclosure in the palm oil sector over time based on data collected on SPOTT (Sustainability Policy Transparency Toolkit). The SPOTT Index is based on the number of points scored by a company during an annual assessment, and the number of companies that were included in that assessment time period. The SPOTT Index shows that ESG disclosure of palm oil companies measured improved between 2014 and 2018. Although we demonstrate proof of concept based on a limited number of companies, continued growth of SPOTT will enable the production of a powerful metric in ESG disclosure beyond palm oil and also serve to incentivise sustainable production and consumption in the sector

Actions on sustainable food production and consumption for the post-2020 global biodiversity framework

Current food production and consumption trends are inconsistent with the Convention on Biological Diversity’s 2050 vision of living in harmony with nature. Here, we examine how, and under what conditions, the post-2020 biodiversity framework can support transformative change in food systems. Our analysis of actions proposed in four science-policy fora reveals that subsidy reform, valuation, food waste reduction, sustainability standards, life cycle assessments, sustainable diets, mainstreaming biodiversity, and strengthening governance can support more sustainable food production and consumption. By considering barriers and opportunities of implementing these actions in Peru and the United Kingdom, we derive potential targets and indicators for the post-2020 biodiversity framework. For targets to support transformation, genuine political commitment, accountability and compliance, and wider enabling conditions and actions by diverse agents are needed to shift food systems onto a sustainable path

Towards a bridging concept for undesirable resilience in social-ecological systems

Resilience is a cross-disciplinary concept that is relevant for understanding the sustainability of the social and environmental conditions in which we live. Most research normatively focuses on building or strengthening resilience, despite growing recognition of the importance of breaking the resilience of, and thus transforming, unsustainable social-ecological systems. Undesirable resilience (cf. lock-ins, social-ecological traps), however, is not only less explored in the academic literature, but its understanding is also more fragmented across different disciplines. This disparity can inhibit collaboration among researchers exploring interdependent challenges in sustainability sciences. In this article, we propose that the term lock-in may contribute to a common understanding of undesirable resilience across scientific fields

Strategies for tropical forest protection and sustainable supply chains: challenges and opportunities for alignment with the UN sustainable development goals

Governance for sustainable development increasingly involves diverse stakeholder groups, with the promise of enhanced legitimacy and effectiveness in decision-making and implementation. The UN sustainable development goals (SDGs) emphasise the important role of multiple (non-state) actors, including businesses and non-governmental organisations, including in efforts to ensure the sustainability of supply chains, and to reduce tropical deforestation and forest degradation. This paper critically analyses sustainability strategies to examine how the UN SDG agendas related to ‘sustainable supply chains’ and ‘tropical forest protection’ are framed and enacted by two contrasting non-state actors: (1) Instituto Centro de Vida (ICV), an NGO in Brazil working to address deforestation, including by supporting farmers to produce commodities, and (2) Unilever, a global consumer goods manufacturer and major buyer of such commodities. By identifying areas of variability in the discursive techniques used by ICV and Unilever, we unearth particular power dynamics that can shape the processes and outcomes of sustainability strategies. This paper finds that the two organisations use diverse strategies at different levels of governance, both participate actively in multi-stakeholder forums to advance their organisations’ goals, but have divergent framings of ‘sustainability’. Despite being considered ‘non-state’ actors, the strategies of the two organisations examined both reflect, and influence, the structural effects of the state in the implementation of non-state organisations’ strategies, and progress towards the SDGs. Although there is alignment of certain strategies related to tropical forest protection, in some cases, there is a risk that more sustainable, alternative approaches to governing forests and supply chains may be excluded