ForesTrade is founded in Vermont, USA with offices in Indonesia, Guatemala and the Netherlands. Pioneered organic spices, essential oils, and Fair Trade Coffee.

ForesTrade was established in Brattleboro Vermont, USA with offices in Europe, Indonesia, and Guatemala. ForesTrade pioneered fair trade practices to the production of quality organic coffee, spices, and essential oils from 1995-2010. As an internationally known product development and trading company, ForesTrade imported their products throughout the world and sold in bulk to wholesalers and manufacturers of organic products. ForesTrade products encouraged small farm development, community socio-economic development, and natural resource conservation.

ForesTrade Receives Socially Responsible Business Award at the Natural Products Expo East

In 1999, ForesTrade received the Socially Responsible Business Award at the Natural Products Expo East in Baltimore, Maryland. This award has been presented to innovative companies in the natural and organic products industry in North America since 1994 for their exemplary business principles and practices.

ForesTrade receives Global Sustainable Business Award from the United Nations at the Johannesburg Earth Summit.

On September 6, 2002 ForesTrade received the prestigious ICC/UNEP World Summit Business Award for Sustainable Development Partnerships at the Johannesburg Earth Summit. ForesTrade was the sole U.S. company to receive this award from the United Nations and the International Chamber of Commerce.

SCAA bestows first Sustainability Award to ForesTrade and partner PPKGO

In 2004 ForesTrade and their partners PPKGO, (the Gayo Organic Coffee Farmers Association) received the Sustainability Award from the Specialty Coffee Association of America (SCAA). PPKGO is a cooperative of over 3000 farmers within 32 communities made up mainly of the Gayo, Javanese and Acehnese ethnic groups in the Gayo Highlands of Aceh Province in Sumatra. This was the first Fair Trade coffee cooperative in Indonesia recognized by the Fairtrade Labeling Organization (FLO) in Bonn, Germany.
Presenting this award for the first time, SCAA’s Sustainability Committee wanted to recognize ForesTrade for “their efforts to strengthen and sustain the communities where coffee farmers live, work and raise their families.” ForesTrade provided the necessary technical assistance and training for implementing and monitoring the Organic and Fairtrade programs for PPKGO as a processor, importer, pre-financer and logistics coordinator.

STC implements a sustainable development strategy in biofuel and palm oil in Aceh

From 2006-2008, STC conducted a strategic assessment of Aceh’s palm oil sector, under the framework of the Aceh Green Vision devised by the province’s first democratically-elected Governor, Irwandi Yusuf. The Aceh Green project’s goal was to promote a sustainable economic recovery of the province in the aftermath of the devastating Tsunami and the long-standing conflict that ended with a peace accord in 2005. This eight-month effort funded by the International Finance Corporation and World Bank culminated in a final report, which contains a review of the constraints and opportunities in the sector and an action plan with follow-on recommendations for policy initiatives, pilot projects, and investment opportunities. One of the key results of this initiative was the creation of the multi-sectoral Aceh Sustainable Palm Oil Working Group.

STC in partnership with Forest Carbon developed a new paradigm for biofuel production in Indonesia by utilizing non-food grade waste streams from the oil palm industry. STC received support from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) under the Indonesia Forest and Climate Support (IFACS) program to produce a new bio-oil product called “Power Oil”: a substitute for diesel and bunker oil which can be used in power plants and industrial steam engines. Power Oil is produced from high free fatty acid (FFA) crude palm oil pressed from waste fruits or from sludge oils recovered from the palm oil processing facilities. The oil has an FFA content of ~25% containing impurities under 2%.

Power oil can be used to replace conventional GHG-emitting imported diesel in combustion engines used for power production in industrial applications such as mills, mines, hotels or malls.PowerOil cost less to produce than biodiesel.

Discussion Draft

STC founded in Bali Indonesia.

Sustainable Trade and Consulting (STC) was created in Bali, Indonesia to implement a new vision for bioenergy. This vision is based on maximizing the use of non-food grade waste materials, partnering with small and medium sized farms, utilizing existing infrastructure, and maximizing efficiency throughout the entire supply chain.

STC designs and builds six palm oil mini mills for biomass waste feedstock production in Aceh, North Sumatra, Riau, and West Kalimantan.

STC contributes technological resources and alternative biofuel materials to the Lombok Biomass Energy Initiative

Over the last two decades, Lombok Island in Indonesia has faced interrelated threats to its energy supply, landscape integrity, water security, and local economy. Prior to the last decade, kerosene functioned as the predominant source of fuel for both household use and agricultural processing.

The Lombok Biomass Energy Initiative’s primary goal was to establish a sustainable supply chain for biomass energy production, processing, and marketing for use in households and rural industries in Lombok. To help the Indonesian government’s goal of eliminating subsidized kerosene, STC worked with the Lombok Initiative to develop alternative biofuels and establish a sustainable supply chain for biomass energy production, processing, and marketing for use in households and rural industries in Lombok.

STC successfully demonstrated the technical and financial viability of the Indonesian Palm Oil Kernel Shells (POKS) from Sumatra and Kalimantan and Candlenut shells from Lombok and Nusa Tenggara Timor province (NTT) as an alternative biomass fuel biofuel to create income opportunities for farmers, help alleviate poverty, reduce dependency on fossil fuels, promote biodiversity and carbon conservation, and enhance water security in Lombok and surrounding islands. Additionally, STC supported the development of improved drying kilns using small-scale gasification technology.

In 2012, STC distributed over 1,200 tonnes of Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO)-certified sustainable palm kernel shells and 400 tons of candlenut (kemiri) shells from stable agroforestry systems as feedstock for small-scale gasification units to over 1,050 farmers drying agricultural products. By 2015, STC had distributed over 40,000 metric tons of biomass fuels to over 8,000 farmers.

Our funders, partners and collaborators for this initiative included: Dutch NL Agency Global Sustainable Biomass Fund (GSBF), Fauna & Flora International (FFI), PT. Export Leaf Indonesia (ELI) (a subsidiary of British American Tobacco (BAT)), and various local small-scale producers, entrepreneurs and NGOs.

STC designs and conducts sustainability learning journeys with MARS, Incorporated and other international corporations and simultaneously designs Integrated Bioenergy Facility in Riau Province, Sumatra

In January of 2013 STC Indonesia assisted the Sustainable Food Lab of Hartland Vermont in creating a Learning Journey for the sustainability team of one of the largest food companies in the world, Mars, Incorporated.

STC’s mission was to give the sustainability managers an experience within the supply chains of palm oil, rice and coconut that would deepen their understanding and stimulate new thinking on how they could impact these supply chains in positive ways. The participants had a chance to study the systems closely and to engage in dialogue with various stakeholders who were part of the system or had important perspectives on it. For this 8 day experience STC Indonesia arranged for the sites to visit and the stakeholders to speak to who could offer the most insight into the complexities of the supply chains and their social and environmental impacts.

The Learning Journey offered a way to see and experience aspects of the palm oil, rice and coconut supply chains that are complex and not easily understood. The goal was to help participants “see” the supply chains through new eyes through dialogues with their colleagues during the journey as well as through visits to various stakeholders.

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Also in 2013, STC developed an integrated model for a facility that can utilize multiple waste streams, plantation biomass from senescent oil palm trees, non-food grade waste fruits, waste oils from processing mills, and biogas from palm oil mill effluent (POME), for energy production in Kabupaten Siak, Province of Riau (Sumatra). This project was sponsored by Energy and Environment Partnership of Indonesia, an initiative from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Finland.

Unlike single-stream facilities, this integrated model enhances synergies by using solid, liquid, and gaseous feedstocks to produce heat, electricity, and other biomass products. The facility can produce over 10MW of green power for direct sale to PLN while generating a planned 90,000 carbon credits. The facility utilizes custom biogas reactors and pond covers with internal paddle-wheels to maximize biogas production and capture from POME. To further reduce COD and BOD levels before effluent is released for land applications, algae are cultivated in open pond systems.

For energy production, solid plantation biomass is pre-treated with heat recovered from the biogas combustion before being converted with cutting edge gasification technology. Excess supplies of non-food grade oil palm fruits and waste oils from the production facilities are used for the production of PowerOil, a low cost alternative to traditional fossil fuel, diesel, and pure refined vegetable oil.

Finally, to ensure that the biomass supply chains are reliable and sustainable, the application of GIS technology is integrated with an interactive Google Earth tool to monitor land use change, calculate GHG emissions savings, and optimize feedstock flows.

The project consortium consists of Maris Projects BV, a Dutch company specializing in POME biogas capture and bioremediation with microalgae production; PT Forest Carbon, an Indonesian GIS company committed to forest conservation; Indonesia Clean Power Ventures, an Australian bioenergy business incubator; and Perkumpulan Elang, an NGO in Riau focussed on resource conservation and community development.

Developed ISCC certified supply chains and infrastructure throughout Indonesia for PAO/POME

From 2015-2017, STC developed supply chains, management systems, and infrastructure throughout Indonesia for palm sludge oil (PSO/POME) compliant with the International Sustainability and Carbon Certification (ISCC) scheme. First, STC concentrated on creating viable means and personnel for the sourcing, transport, storage, export, and trade of PSO/POME in Indonesia and Malaysia. This was followed by purchasing from selected suppliers and trial shipments to the EU and North America in 2015-2016. After significant outreach to the Indonesia palm oil industry and the setup of a logistical hub in Riau, Sumatra STC was officially certified as a collector and trader of PSO/POME in January 2017.

STC works with the United Kingdom Climate Change Unit (UKCCU) to support Green Economic Growth in Papua and West Papua, Indonesia

Papua and West Papua provinces are Indonesia’s least developed but most resource rich regions. In order to improve local Papuan livelihoods and landscapes, STC has been working closely with visionary “green” entrepreneurs, aspiring progressive business owners and farmers in Papua Indonesia to incubate nascent businesses and prepare producers and value chain industries for better practices and market positions. This project is called Green Economic Growth for Papuan Provinces (GEGPP).

This project has four development goals:

• Green Economy: Collaborate with farmers on creating ecologically friendly and high yielding cultivation techniques to increase the quality of their product.
• Alleviating Poverty: Through supporting local economic development, we can create sustainable business opportunities in one of Indonesia’s most challenged and underdeveloped regions.
• Empowering Women Entrepreneurs: In the Nutmeg farming communities all family members of farmers are involved in cultivation, most of the nutmeg processing being female driven.
• Promoting Cultural Diversity: Our vision is to market nutmeg as a cultural bio-trade product, preserving traditional farming practices and installing ethnic harmony

STC’s services include providing technical training, system frameworks, promotion of products at International conferences, and mentoring to green entrepreneurs to improve their overall business skills and the production, processing and marketing of their products.STC is focusing its efforts on many promising green enterprises: holistic cocoa production, locally controlled community forestry, wild harvested nutmeg butter, and sago production for value added products. STC’s services include providing technical training, ideas, system frameworks, and mentoring to green entrepreneurs to improve their overall business skills and the production, processing and marketing of their products.

The project is funded by the Climate Change Unit of the UK’s Department of Internal Finance and International Development (DFID) and Ekonomi Hijau Indonesia.