His tirade of remarks, laced with half truths and confusing the agro-management practices between palm oil producers Malaysia and Indonesia, was irksome.

To the Malaysian group of palm oil captains and experts led by Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Datuk Peter Chin to the Netherlands, Belgium and the UK recently, they reflected unfounded fears a majority of pressure groups from the other side of the world have.

With environment at the top of the political agenda, the sustainable biofuels debate can be an emotional one in Europe that has piqued the interest of global NGOs like Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, Wetlands International, BothEnds, Oxfam and WWF.

Legislators and NGOs alike across Europe have flocked to listen to the Malaysian story — whether Malaysia is able to balance the social and economic criteria — as well as how a balance can be struck between deforestation and opening new land for the crop, as laws come down hard on the imports.

Chin extolled palm oil as a means to overcoming rural poverty, and that the government is therefore determined to develop the industry sustainably. He stressed that Malaysia plans to increase production through good practices and better yields, and referred to the polemic over deforestation and biodiversity loss.

Malaysian Palm Oil Council chief executive officer Tan Sri Yusof Basiron outlined the background of plantation agriculture, how many of the systems pioneered by the British colonial masters have been running sustainably for decades now.

In the 80s, forests were cut to plant rubber, oil palm and cocoa to enable the people to get a decent level of income, but these practices (cutting forests) have dropped to a trickle a decade later. Only 20 per cent of the land is for agriculture with slightly over 60 per cent covered with forests.

“The main thrust of oil palm industry players today is to increase the supply through yield improvement — from four tonnes per ha to six or eight tonnes, without opening any more land, while better clones and seeds are constantly sought,” he explained.

Palm oil contributes about five to six per cent of the country’s gross domestic product, and provides employment to 1.4 million workers.

“We are making the best use of our resources and we disagree that we have been opening new land,” he said.

Malaysian Palm Oil Board (MPOB) chairman and Golden Hope Plantations Bhd chief executive Datuk Sabri Ahmad said the certification process by the Roundtable of Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), has already been in place on a business-to-business basis for companies like Golden Hope, Kuala Lumpur Kepong Bhd and the IOI group.

Golden Hope, which is a founder member of the RSPO, was also the first plantation company in Malaysia to receive the Global 500 Roll of Honour from the United Nations Environment Programme for the commercialisation of its zero burning replanting techniques which include pulverising the biomass back to the soil.

Like Golden Hope, major plantations have been looking to improving efficiency by reducing the levels of chemicals through organic compost and advanced pest control system such as using the barn owl.

MPOB has also sought its scientists to map the flora and fauna which make up the biodiversity while the board is also looking to zero emissions to trap methane gas.

The industry, he stressed, has been efficient in sustaining agro-management practices, with focus on food as the main criterion.

Both ends recognised the importance of palm oil for economic development, but was concerned with the deforestation of second generation rainforest and want to see plantations diverted to wasteland. They want the Malaysian Government to address the question of indigenous people's right to decide how to use their customary land.

MP for Serian, Datuk Richard Riot anak Jaem, who hails from the Bidayuh ethnic group, said 10 million hectares of land in Sarawak has been earmarked as native customary rights land.

These natives, he said, want to improve their social standing and not be left behind, and palm oil could be the way out.

Wetlands International has blamed palm oil as a driving force behind the destruction of tropical peatlands by deforestation, soil degradation and fires. Besides causing the destruction of large areas of rainforests, palm oil plantations on peatlands also cause massive emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.

The issue of peat took centrestage because Wetlands International has been vociferous in its claims that large tracts of peatland in Sarawak were being converted into oil palm areas. Draining about one metre of the soil when planting the crop on peatland will emit 90 tonnes of carbon dioxide.

NGOs have alleged that Malaysia contributes 13 per cent of the carbon dioxide emissions through oil palm with Indonesia contributing more than 60 per cent.

Planters chose peat soil as the last resort as it costs more than 40 per cent to develop, plus it involves higher maintenance costs compared to mineral soil.

From a business perspective, Sabri argued, peat soil would not be the first choice although with proper management (to reduce oxidation), shallow peat areas can be fertile and productive for the crop.

United Plantations Bhd vice-chairman and executive director Carl Bek-Nielsen pointed out that some of the claims by Wetlands International about peat soil were misleading, as less than 11 per cent of the total area planted under oil palm in Malaysia was on peat soil.

Most of these plantings were developed over the past 25 to 30 years, when greenhouse gas emissions was a non-existent issue.

“Oil palm development on peat soil, if exposed to good water management, is capable of sustaining favourable yields and has contributed immensely towards uplifting poverty levels in particular Sarawak, which was a noble thing.”

He also felt that it would be advisable to prioritise oil palm plantings on mineral soils vis-à-vis peat soils as the latter were more marginal in nature and could neither match yields nor infrastructural development cost of mineral soil.

“Right from your general upkeep practices to harvesting and fruit evacuation is more cumbersome on peat soils compared to mineral soils,” he added.

MPOB estimated that the proportion of oil palm that were grown in shallow, medium and deep peat soil in Malaysia is to a 60:30:10 ratio.

Wetlands International wanted to know if the Malaysian Government is proposing to its investors to stay out of peat soil by issuing a moratorium, at least until the RSPO has all its processes in place.

During several of the sessions which were held in the Hague, Brussels and London, some of them resorted to using the orang utan as a totemic figure to address the biofuel debate.

Chin fielded the orang utan genocide accusation hurled at Malaysia, saying loggers and plantation companies in Sabah and Sarawak shared the concern to protect the country’s mascot from extinction.

Transparency was the main grouse, admitted the NGOs, during the last leg of the Malaysian mission.

Friends of Earth, in welcoming the dialogue session with the Malaysian delegation as frank, said NGOs were also frustrated by Malaysia’s reluctance to acknowledge the environmental issues.

Apart from more transparency and information on future land use plans, it also wants to be in the know of customary rights, biodiversity, high conservation value forest and carbon dioxide impact.

Greenpeace’s strong message: “You say there’s no deforestation, we say there is. We can’t get any further without transparency.”

They said that their NGO colleagues in Malaysia often have difficulty obtaining information from the authorities.

They argue that palm oil can only be considered “green” if it has a positive carbon dioxide balance and believe that it compares less well to the other oils if the full lifecycle is taken into account.

The famous Lone Droscher Nielsen, from Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation, widely respected for her work with the orang utan in Indonesia, also claimed that Malaysian companies were not respecting the rules when they operate in Indonesia.

WWF wanted to hear how Malaysia would interest the smallholders to join the RSPO and how it would police the scheme. They said the bioenergy industry needed clarity on what to tell consumers, and called for full RSPO commitment to create a climate of certainty.

While the engagement with the NGOs has enabled a common understanding about sustainability concerns, the ongoing dialogue between Malaysia and the European civil societies must continue — regularly and not on an ad hoc basis.

Never mind if there are claims that some of the green activists could be working for other crops or even claims that the whole biofuel debate could have sprouted from the oil and food industry which has to put up with the high CPO prices.

Even if the RSPO with the certification process that involves auditing of the processes would provide Malaysia with a better report card, there must be constant policing to ensure that Malaysia has taken the lead in this fight against global warming.