Measurement and assessment of impacts from management practices is an important component of incorporating sustainability into agricultural businesses and supply chains. Building off of their post on the necessity of business engagement, Michael Zrust and Sophia Gnych of the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) offer a snapshot of how their Biodiversity and Palm Oil Project is strengthening monitoring of impacts. ZSL is one of the grantees under the Biodiversity in Agricultural Commodities Program (BACP), and is currently participating in the tenth annual Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil.
High Conservation Values (HCVs) are a set of social and ecological values that have been acknowledged as a high priority for conservation. HCVs 1-6, as stipulated by the HCV Resource Network, include the presence of endemic or endangered species, rare or endangered ecosystems, and resources and ecosystem services on which local communities depend for their sociocultural values and livelihoods—all of which are significantly threatened by large-scale land conversion from forest to agriculture.
In order to meet the criteria for Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) certification—a benchmark for sustainable practices in the industry—plantation owners are obliged to maintain and protect HCV areas within their concessions; however, plantations often lack the right tools and capacity in order to do this well.
Regular patrol monitoring of HCV areas in oil palm plantations can provide plantation managers with the information they need to mitigate the negative impacts of oil palm cultivation on biodiversity (HCV 1-4); however, current guidance on how to do this is limited. The Zoological Society of London (ZSL) is developing a practical protocol with accompanying software and training modules to enable field staff to effectively monitor key variables in HCV areas in oil palm landscapes. It is intended to support an adaptive management approach for improved protection of biodiversity within plantations, whereby management actions are informed by the results of monitoring. Field results are presented in the form of clear and easily understandable graphs and maps so that managers can quickly and easily make decisions on HCV management and prioritise resources.
In 2012, ZSL has developed five monitoring protocols: for habitat structure, biodiversity surveying, camera trapping, freshwater monitoring, and threat assessment based on routine patrols. Software modules have already been developed for the routine patrol and camera trapping protocols, and other modules will be developed to accompany the remaining protocols in 2013. The routine patrol system has been field trialled, and training modules are currently being tested in preparation for the training of plantation staff at our two project partner field sites in November.
This low-cost, user-friendly solution allows managers to use current staffing structures, with little extra training of patrol staff, to record both internal and external human threat indices for HCV areas. Given that human actions account for most of the threats to HCV areas, this monitoring system enables RSPO members to fulfill part of their obligations under Principle 5 of the certification scheme – environmental responsibility and conservation of natural resources and biodiversity. Furthermore, the results inform day-to-day decision-making and staff management without the need for collecting expensive baseline data, and the system can be adapted to almost any production landscape context.
The Protocol will be presented and launched at this year’s Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil, along with ZSL’s online Sustainable Palm oil Platform (SPP). The SPP website delivers a broad range of information and resources for all stakeholders along the palm oil supply chain. It includes stakeholder case studies on sustainable practices, information on corporate commitments, and independent scientific studies and research literature. It also provides information on certification schemes and investor-led initiatives as well as updates on international and national legislation relevant to palm oil and ‘how-to’ guides for various aspects of palm oil procurement and certification. The Roundtable will be attended by key business representatives, policy makers, and NGO personnel and is therefore a prime opportunity to showcase and discuss the latest initiatives and projects being trialed in pursuit of more sustainable business practices in the palm oil sector.
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