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he Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin) is encouraging big palm oil players to invite two local companies to commit to the Indonesian Palm Oil Pledge, as part of its campaign to press the government for the revision of regulations regarding sustainable oil palm plantation practices.

The chamber'€™s environment, climate change and sustainable development deputy chairwoman, Shinta Widjaya Kamdani, said it was important for the industry group to promote sustainable oil palm plantation practices beyond the four large palm oil companies that had earlier made the pledge.

On Sep. 24, four palm oil industry giants '€” Asian Agri, Cargill, Golden Agri-Resources and Wilmar '€” signed the pledge, committing themselves to responsible oil palm production that was environmentally and socially responsible.

'€œWe won'€™t stop with the four palm oil companies that have already pledged. We'€™re targeting two more companies in 2015, both of which are local firms,'€ Shinta told reporters on the sidelines of the conference in Jakarta on Friday.

Shinta declined to name the two Indonesian companies, but she did say the two firms, when combined with the four that had committed to the pledge before them, had produced around 80 percent of the country'€™s palm oil output.

Indonesia supplies around 31 million metric tons per year, or 50 percent of the global palm oil output, while Malaysia supplies around 40 percent and Africa and Latin America the remaining 10 percent.

As the world'€™s largest palm oil producer, the country has often been described as the world'€™s third-biggest polluter as it has allegedly expanded its oil palm estates, which are currently estimated at almost 10 million hectares, by destroying its rain forests.

For this reason, the chamber will host a series of discussions, set to be held in the first six months of 2015, for the majority of stakeholders in the industry, with the aim of formulating policy recommendations for the government.

Shinta said it was important that the business community, the government and other stakeholders in the country reached a consensus on several issues of importance, including oil palm traceability, transparency, certification, smallholder handling and jurisdictional approach.

'€œAll stakeholders need to be on the same page so the government can revise the rules. That'€™s our priority,'€ she told The Jakarta Post.

According to her, the main issue of contention for the business community was the definition
of High Carbon Stock (HCS) and High Conservation Value (HCV) areas, which had cast doubt on the country'€™s commitment to sustainability.

Jean-Louis Guillou, president director of palm oil giant Cargill, said his firm took the issue of ending deforestation in the industry seriously, just as much as raising the economic welfare of communities residing on plantation land.

'€œIt'€™s the combination of trying to achieve these two goals [...] that makes forums like this especially valuable,'€ he told the Post.

'€œWe absolutely need to partner with other stakeholders and with the government to help us put together a framework that allows us to achieve both goals simultaneously.'€