On this edition of The Sustainable Commodities Podcast, hosts Barnaby Patchett and Judith Murdoch are joined by Reza Azmi, Executive Director of Wild Asia.

Wild Asia is a Malaysian social enterprise that takes a profoundly different approach to sustainable palm oil. Reza and his team work directly with independent smallholder farmers to build trust, improve soil health and prove that sustainable agriculture is not only possible but financially rewarding.

In this episode, we discuss.

• The Reality of Certification: Why focusing solely on the 20% of palm oil that is currently certified ignores majority of the industry, and how the biggest impact can be made by supporting the remaining 80% of uncertified farmers.
• Spiral and WAGS: How the Wild Asia Group Scheme (WAGS) builds a vital, on-the-ground support network for farmers, while the 'Spiral' initiative acts as an 'Intel inside' model for mills, ensuring buyers can directly fund and source from regenerative smallholder projects.
• Bio-Farms and Soil Health: Why returning to a focus on soil biology, using artisanal ferments and natural processes instead of expensive synthetic inputs, is the key to resilient, high-yielding and profitable smallholder farms.
• The Buyer's Role: Why corporations need to rethink their approach to sustainable procurement, moving beyond compliance checks to actively supporting farmers through direct investment and long-term partnerships.

If you want to understand what true grassroots sustainability looks like and how we can effectively support smallholders in the transition to regenerative agriculture, this is a must-listen!

Links
Reza Azmi
Wild Asia
One Nine Nine
Murdoch Associates

Welcome to the latest episode of the Sustainable Commodities Podcast! This week, hosts Barnaby Patchett and Judith Murdoch sit down with Alejandro Diaz, Landscape Finance Manager at Commonland.

Commonland is an international NGO pioneering large-scale, long-term landscape restoration. Unlike traditional conservation efforts that focus solely on nature, Commonland treats landscapes as holistic systems where the environment, local communities, and businesses must thrive together. Alejandro takes us through the complex world of landscape finance and explains what it really takes to fund the transition to regenerative agriculture.

In this episode, we unpack:

• The 4 Returns Framework: How Commonland measures success through four key metrics: Return of Inspiration, Social Returns, Natural Returns, and Financial Returns.

• Moving Beyond Short-Term Funding: Why standard three-year grants hold conservation back, and why restoring a landscape actually requires 20-year, flexible, and patient capital.

• De-risking Regenerative Agriculture: The massive financial and operational hurdles farmers face when changing their practices, and why they cannot be expected to shoulder that risk alone.

• The AlVelAl Success Story: A look at Commonland’s work in southeastern Spain, where a cooperative of over 600 farmers is regenerating a million hectares of almond and olive production using shared resources like machinery banks and premium pricing.

• Landscapes vs. Supply Chains: Why corporations and investors need to look beyond their narrow commodity supply chains and start investing in the broader resilience of the regions they source from.

If you are interested in blended finance, regenerative agriculture, and how we can practically fund a more resilient food system, this is a must-listen.

Links
Commonland
One Nine Nine
Murdoch Associates

Welcome to the latest episode of the Sustainable Commodities Podcast! This week, hosts Barnaby Patchett and Judith Murdoch sit down with a true palm oil industry heavyweight: Mark Wong, Head of Downstream Sustainability at SD Guthrie International (formerly Sime Darby).

As the world's largest producer of certified sustainable palm oil, operating in over 90 countries, SD Guthrie is at the forefront of the industry's transformation. Mark takes us behind the curtain to explore the realities of driving sustainability at a massive global scale.

In this episode, we unpack:

• The Evolution of Palm Oil Sustainability: From pioneering zero-burning replanting techniques in 1985 to the RSPO and beyond.
• Tackling Forced Labor Allegations How SD Guthrie responded to the 2020 US Customs and Border Protection Withhold Release Order by completely overhauling their labor practices, including reimbursing recruitment fees and improving worker dialogue.
• EUDR: Why data management and sharing are the biggest hurdles to compliance, and how the regulation's strict requirements risk excluding vulnerable smallholder farmers.
• The Traceability Challenge: The crucial difference between direct and indirect smallholders and why mapping the full supply chain is so incredibly complex.
• The Future of the Industry: Why we need to stop treating palm oil as a uniform commodity, and how regenerative agriculture and science-based targets will shape the next decade of production.

If you work in forest-risk commodities or want to understand the reality of making palm oil sustainable, this is a must-listen.

SD Guthrie International
One Nine Nine
Murdoch Associates