FX.co ★ South Korean palm oil giant stripped of sustainability status

According to the BBC, palm oil giant Korindo Group has caused significant damage to the environment. Reportedly, the company had been buying up swathes of Asia's largest remaining rainforests in the remote Indonesian province of Papua. As a result, it destroyed valuable tropical forests in Indonesia. And the day of reckoning came.

The Korindo group has been rejected from the world's leading green certification body in the wake of a BBC investigation. Notably, this is not the first time the company has been accused of such destructive practices. In 2020, Greenpeace and forensic experts managed to find out the wrongdoings of the company. The palm giant burnt protected forests in the Indonesian province of Papua.

Greenpeace and the BBC provided evidence of illegal actions of the Korindo Group related to the destruction of 30,000 hectares of high conservation forest in breach of FSC regulations as the company was "on the balance of probability … supporting the violation of traditional and human rights for its own benefit."

The International Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) conducted its own investigation. According to its results, the South Korean food giant ignored the "green" strategy in the production of palm oil, printing, and other wood products.

Following the decree of the Forest Council, from October of this year, the FSC has revoked the license from Korindo Group. Notably, this license indicates sustainable logging as well as concern for improving living conditions in those countries where a company's production is sold.