Palm oil and primates, can they coexist?

Nature & Climate Perspective

**Integrated wildlife corridors in palm oil concessions offer critical ecological connectivity for primates but cannot replicate the high-integrity biomass density of primary forests. **

• Agro-forestry corridors and High Conservation Value (HCV) buffer zones facilitate primate movement across fragmented landscapes, yet edge effects continue to constrain native species carrying capacity.
• LULUCF restoration alongside agricultural concessions delivers localized carbon stock stabilization, though carbon sequestration rates remain inherently lower than contiguous intact tropical peatlands and primary canopy.
• Long-term ecological resilience depends on expanding contiguous protected buffers to prevent soil degradation, hydrological disruption, and systemic ecosystem collapse driven by monoculture encroachment.

Market & Policy Outlook

**Concession-level conservation efforts must align with ICVCM Core Carbon Principles to defend corporate Scope 3 and SBTi integrity against leakage and non-permanence risks. **

• Emerging regulatory baselines under the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) and Article 6.4 framework require auditable deforestation-free supply chains beyond ad-hoc concession-level coexistence projects.
• Voluntary carbon market dynamics heavily penalize nature-based credits lacking clear ICVCM CCP labels, driving capital toward jurisdictional programs over fragmented plantation-scale offsets.
• Corporate off-takers are compelled to align with SBTi Forest, Land and Agriculture (FLAG) targets to ensure that agricultural yield preservation does not obscure indirect land-use change (ILUC) within Scope 3 emissions reporting.