Petaling Jaya, 3 February 2023 - The United States Customs and Border Protection (USCBP) has modified its forced labour finding against Sime Darby Plantation Berhad (SDP), which means, effective immediately, the USCBP will now permit the importation of palm oil from SDP into the United States.
With this decision, the USCBP has recognised the comprehensive process undertaken by SDP in the last two years to review, revise and – where necessary – upgrade its protocols for recruiting, managing and working with its workers.
Mohamad Helmy Othman Basha, Group Managing Director of Sime Darby Plantation, commented: “This exercise has been hugely valuable in establishing a market-leading approach to ensure our employees feel safe, satisfied, supported and fairly treated.”
Recognising the comprehensive effort to implement change across SDP’s Malaysian operations, led by Chief Financial Officer Renaka Ramachandran and overseen by its Board Sustainability Committee, Mohamad Helmy said: “It took us more than 500,000 man-hours to undertake our reviews and to revise what we already had in place. To ensure change is embraced and entrenched, we also put in place key enablers to empower our workers. It is essential that such safeguards are in place to protect those who are vulnerable.”
SDP introduced a number of industry firsts as part of its renewed commitments. These include:
Mohamad Helmy also recognised that the sweeping changes in labour practices and standards that the Group has implemented across its operations would not have been achieved without the hard work, contributions and collaboration of many people and organisations. “Our gratitude goes foremost to all our employees for their commitment and dedication; it took us many months to get here. We also thank our current and former Directors for their guidance and wisdom, the many partners who worked with us, our shareholders and the Malaysian government for all their support and assistance. We were never alone.
“Leaving no stone unturned, Sime Darby Plantation has identified and invested in what we believe is a best-practice approach to improving the experience of our workers. We could not have done this by ourselves and we believe, that these industry-leading initiatives are a blueprint for the wider palm oil industry to follow. We would be delighted to share them with our peers and partners in the sector,” Mohamad Helmy said.
As the world’s leading sustainable palm oil producer, SDP will continue to work with non-governmental organisations and like-minded parties to advocate for change at an industry level. It is vital that the palm oil industry does all it can to meet its responsibilities to its people and to the planet.
Thanking the USCBP, Mohamad Helmy said: “Having embraced the principles of sustainable development several years ago, we already had a comprehensive range of policies and procedures in place. Many were industry leading practices at the time. Despite that, we found room for enhancements in implementation.
“Today, our commitment to all our stakeholders is vigilance and a continuing responsibility to produce palm oil that is free of forced labour.”
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