Palm oil industry gathers for SCORE 2026 to navigate sustainability mandates and trade shifts

In Bogor, Indonesia, a two-day forum is being organized to help palm oil producers navigate a landscape that has grown suddenly more complex and demanding. The Sustainable Commodities & Responsible Engagement Forum, or SCORE 2026, will convene in mid-September at a resort conference center to address a fundamental problem: the industry is caught between new global regulations that require proof of legal, deforestation-free production and a major shift in how Indonesia's palm oil exports will be managed.

The stakes are concrete. Companies that cannot demonstrate where their palm oil came from—down to the plot of land—face exclusion from supply chains, financial penalties, and commercial uncertainty. Buyers in Europe and elsewhere are no longer accepting vague assurances. They want data: geolocation records, verification of legality, evidence that no forest was cleared to grow the crop. Without these systems in place, a palm oil producer can find itself locked out of markets that represent significant revenue.

The timing of SCORE 2026 reflects a critical juncture. Indonesia is implementing a centralized export system, known as DSI, that will change how palm oil moves from producer to buyer. Simultaneously, international regulations are tightening—the European Union's deforestation regulation, corporate sustainability reporting standards, and due diligence requirements all demand that companies know their supply chains in granular detail. Rauf Prasodjo, who directs sustainability solutions at the forum's organizer, PT Inovasi Digital, describes the challenge plainly: if the new export system becomes disconnected from the data systems that track sustainability and compliance, businesses will face disruption. Information that once flowed seamlessly between traders, producers, and auditors could fragment, leaving everyone uncertain about whether they remain in compliance.

The forum is designed as a working platform, not a lecture series. Participants—growers, traders, consumer goods companies, financial institutions, and policy experts—will hear from industry leaders including Luke Mahony, CEO of the company managing Indonesia's centralized export system, and Joseph D'Cruz, who leads the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil. They will also hear from representatives of major buyers like Unilever and traders like Musim Mas and Wilmar International. The goal is to leave with concrete partnerships and verified pathways forward, not just understanding.

What makes this moment urgent is the convergence of pressures. Certification schemes like ISPO and RSPO, which have long been the industry standard, now sit alongside buyer-specific requirements and mandatory compliance frameworks. A producer must track not just whether they hold a certificate, but whether their data systems can satisfy multiple, sometimes overlapping, regulatory demands. The forum addresses this directly: how to integrate trade operations with verified compliance data, how to streamline reporting, and how to unlock access to sustainable finance—capital that increasingly flows only to producers who can prove their practices.

The broader context is a global shift in commodity governance. Regulators and buyers are no longer willing to accept supply chain opacity. They want to know that the palm oil in a product did not drive deforestation, did not displace communities, and was produced legally. For an industry built on scale and efficiency, this represents a fundamental change in how business is conducted. SCORE 2026 is an attempt to help the industry make that transition before the new systems go live and before market access becomes contingent on compliance.