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

Welcome to the first episode of the Sustainable Commodities Podcast for 2026! After a short break, hosts Barnaby Patchett and Judith Murdoch are back to tackle the pressing question facing businesses this year: What comes next?

With the 2025 deforestation targets now in the rearview mirror, companies are under increasing pressure to demonstrate not just ambition, but tangible results. To help navigate this shifting landscape, we are joined by Dr. Jeff Milder, Director of the Accountability Framework Initiative (AFi).
In this episode, Jeff walks us through the AFi’s recently published Operational Guidance on Commitments and Progress Pathways – a new roadmap for setting, achieving, and reporting on goals to eliminate deforestation, conversion, and human rights abuses in agricultural/forestry supply chains.
We explore what new guidance means for your business and how it can help you at every step of the journey – from making high-level pledges to ongoing monitoring.

Key topics discussed:

• The "Why Now": Understanding the new AFi guidance released in December and why it’s so useful for businesses in 2026.
• Commitments vs. Reality: How to set credible time-bound targets and what to do if you’ve missed them.
• Engagement vs. Exclusion: How to handle non-compliance in the supply chain—is it better to cut them loose or help them improve?
• The Regulatory Landscape: How the AFi framework aligns with and supports compliance for major regulations like the EUDR (EU Deforestation Regulation).
• Building Trust: Avoiding "greenwashing" and the danger of "greenhushing" by communicating your progress (and failures) transparently. Whether you are struggling with traceability, worried about compliance, or just trying to set your next set of sustainability goals, Dr. Milder explains how AFi can provide the practical roadmap you need.

Useful Links:
The Guidance - Operational Guidance: Commitments and Progress Pathways
Accountability Framework initiative
One Nine Nine
Murdoch Associates

In this special end-of-year edition of The Sustainable Commodities Podcast, hosts Barnaby Patchett and Judith Murdoch look back at a chaotic 2025 and look ahead to what’s next.

Fresh from a two-week trip to Malaysia, Judith shares some on-the-ground insights from the RSPO RT and the Malaysian Palm Oil Council tour.
The duo then tackles the defining topic of the year: the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR). After another delay and further changes they dissect why the implementation has been a "dreadful" bureaucratic failure, risking the exclusion of smallholders while failing to solve the core problem of deforestation.
Finally, they grade the year in sustainability (it’s not an 'A'!!) before looking ahead to 2026, moving away from doom and gloom to focus on solutions, soil health, and the potential of regenerative agriculture.

One Nine Nine
Murdoch Associates

Has the myopic focus on traceability hamstrung EUDR?
How can we integrate nature and biodiversity into corporate policies?
Will regenerative agriculture be the bedrock of future corporate action?

With us to answer these questions is Neil Judd, Co-founder of Proforest, a global not-for-profit working to advance the sustainable production and sourcing of forest-risk commodities including palm oil, soy, sugar, and timber.

Neil shares insights from Proforest's 25-year journey, highlighting the industry's shift from minimal action to widespread recognition of the need for responsible sourcing. The discussion focuses on the complexities of sustainable supply chains, from the evolution of voluntary standards to the impact of new legislation like EUDR.

Proforest
One Nine Nine
Murdoch Associates

How do you make toothpaste more sustainable? Turns out there are some real challenges!
In this episode, we’re talking about mint, palm oil and oleochemicals.

Barnaby and Judith are joined by Ben Thornton Jones, former Director of Sustainable Supply at Haleon, the global consumer health company behind household brands like Aquafresh, Sensodyne, and Panadol.

Ben offers a fascinating look into the complexities and innovative solutions required when sourcing sustainable ingredients for some of the world’s best known consumer health products – especially when it comes to tracing oleochemicals and derivatives!

Links
Ben Thornton-Jones
Haleon
One Nine Nine
Murdoch Associates

This week on the podcast, we’re talking deforestation, supply chain monitoring, the power and limitations of tech platforms and data, and why working in partnership with producers is the most effective way to drive positive change!

To help us, we welcome Priscillia Moulin, Senior Advisor for Indonesian Environmental Non-Profit Earthqualizer Foundation, and Director of Strategy at MosaiX - a European based start-up helping organisations meet sustainability targets and navigate evolving legislation.

Priscillia brings her decade of experience in NDPE (No deforestation, No peat, No exploitation) policy implementation in the palm oil sector – as we talk about how we can turn policy into practice, especially in light of legislation like EUDR.

Along the way, we talk about the challenges and opportunities, the role of tech platforms, and the balance between activism and collaborative engagement with corporates when it comes to advancing sustainability.


Links
Earthqualizer Foundation
MosiaX
Inovasi Digital
One Nine Nine
Murdoch Associates