On March 6, 2019, the quarterly magazine Médor published information according to which ING bank has momentarily stopped providing loans to Socfin group and would not relaunch till the group’s palm oil plantation are RSPO certified. The information was relayed by many Belgian media which said “according to Médor.”

Luxembourgian Société financière des caoutchoucs (Socfin), the mother house of Cameroonian Socapalm, published a statement on March 21 disproving the rumour. It also indicated that its palm oil plantations would be RSPO certified by end 2021.

Socfin launched its zero deforestation policy in 2016 by focusing on "High Carbon Stock" (HCS). In the palm oil sector, the "HCS" methodology identifies forest zones that should be absolutely protected because they have a high quantity of carbon as well as animal and vegetal biodiversity.

Currently, it has more than 25,998 ha of palm oil plantations apart from the 18,265 ha purchased from Socapalm in 2006.

Sylvain Andzongo