Introducing the EUDR Compliance Collective -Effortless, audit-ready compliance

Quick summary

We are launching the EUDR Compliance Collective (https://www.palmoil.io/eudr-compliance-collective) - Audit-ready EUDR compliance for risk assessment and mitigation with zero effort. We do the risk mitigation work for you, based on the collective needs of our members. We track deforestation and legal risks cases, monitor them, ensure they don’t enter your supply chain, and provide all the reporting you need to comply. 

The problems ECC is solving

Due Diligence Statements are the easy part of EUDR: Risk Assessment & Mitigation is the real work 

Since the EUDR became law, there has been intense, and arguably misplaced focus on Due Diligence Statements (Article 9). While DDS is still important, this focus has neglected the more important and challenging part of the regulation - Article 10 (Risk Assessment) and Article 11 (Risk Mitigation). Without effective risk assessment and mitigation, operators face substantial risks. For example, we have verified over 1,400 EUDR high-risk conversion cases and over 400+ human rights violations currently within EU supply chains. 

You can’t mitigate what you don’t see 

Most DDS service providers have woefully inadequate risk assessment and mitigation approaches. First, many providers mitigate risks by checking if a supplier is RSPO-certified. The vast majority of RSPO volumes are certified as mass balance, so are not traceable to the plot. Second, many service providers are only checking plots based on planted area, not the larger property boundaries. This means they will very likely miss non-compliant material leaking into supply chains as well as future risks. 

Lack of expertise

Third, most EUDR service providers lack palm industry expertise and are relying solely on supplier self-reporting or AI to detect legal and supplier risks. While useful, neither are a substitute for expert knowledge in finding and prioritizing risks, especially insights not in the public domain.  

Duplicating efforts

Finally, EU operators share 80% or more of their supply chain, so they will be exposed to the same set of deforestation and legal risks. Conducting risk mitigation independently will duplicate efforts, waste resources, and be extremely difficult for smaller operators without dedicated personnel.

How the ECC solves these problems 

We are launching the EUDR Compliance Collective (ECC) to address the risk assessment and mitigation needs of operators and non-operators sourcing palm-based products.  

A collective approach is better than going it alone 

Rather than trying to independently assess risks and manage mitigation, ECC is pioneering a collective approach. Our expert team tracks all the deforestation and legal cases in our member’s supply chains and undertake mitigation on their behalf. Members don’t need to do anything. 

Comprehensive risk assessments (Article 10)

To ensure all members are compliant with Article 10’s Risk Assessment requirements, ECC provides them with comprehensive country and supplier risk assessment reports. The reports summarize the presence of forest and deforestation, outstanding legal issues, human rights issues, indigenous peoples conflicts, and supply chain complexity risk associated with their supply chain. 

Members also benefit from annual and monthly deforestation and grievance analytics tracked by Palmoil.io’s jurisdictional dashboards and over one thousand supplier dashboards, updated every month. This ensures ECC members not only fulfil their EUDR compliance requirements but also receive timely insights into their suppliers’ overall risk performance and help scope new EUDR compliant suppliers. 

We do the risk mitigation for you (Article 11)

ECC not only finds deforestation and legal cases that most DDS systems will miss but also mitigates the risk. We manage all identified cases on our ECC Case Tracker and prioritize them for engagement.  Our team brings deep expertise of upstream risks, most of which are not in the public domain, as well as the skills to conduct regular deforestation analysis of large and complex supply chains, and engage with suppliers who are often two or three tiers removed from the operator.

What engagement looks like

For example, when new forest loss is detected near your supply chain, our goal is to determine who did it, whether they intend to plant oil palm, and if so, how do they plan to segregate it from the EU. We then monitor the areas to ensure it remains unplanted, or if it is planted, sufficiently escalated long before the oil palm reaches maturity. We have similar procedures for legal, human rights, and indigenous peoples related risks. 

Our expert team conducts risk mitigation on behalf of our members, so they have the assurance any shipment has only a negligible risk of non-compliance along with proof that through ECC, you made a significant effort to comply with the law. 

Still need due diligence support?

For members who still need support with their due diligence statements, we offer an optional DDS Service. We screen your plots for deforestation and legal risks with our secure Plot Check tool. You can then download a report of your plot results as well as correctly formatted GeoJSON files for upload to the EU DDS system. And if you don’t have plots, we can provide plots based on our traceability model for any mill or supplier in your supply chain. More details here.

So to recap

ECC provides audit-ready EUDR compliance for risk assessment and mitigation with zero effort. We do the risk mitigation work for you, based on the collective needs of our members. We track deforestation and legal risk cases, monitor them, and ensure they don’t enter your supply chain, and provide all the reporting you need to comply. ECC is the most effective and affordable way to be EUDR-compliant. 

How to become am ECC member

Membership is open to any company classified as an EU operator as well as non-operators who want to keep track of EUDR compliance efforts. We have two pricing tiers, one for operators and one for non-operators and SMEs. We offer affordable options so that all companies can fully comply and avoid risks in their palm oil supply chain.  

So join us today! Write to us at info@maphubs.com  You will find further information here - https://www.palmoil.io/eudr-compliance-collective.