Environmental Governance and ISPO Implementation Success in Oil Palm Plantation Landscapes: The Mediating Role of Corporate Environmental Commitment

Environmental governance plays a critical role in shaping the effectiveness of sustainability certification implementation in perennial plantation systems, particularly in oil palm plantation landscapes associated with forest transformation and socio-ecological risks. In Indonesia, the Indonesian Sustainable Palm Oil (ISPO) scheme functions as a mandatory certification system aimed at strengthening environmental accountability. However, variations in implementation outcomes suggest that compliance alone does not guarantee effective certification implementation. This study examines how internal governance mechanisms shape ISPO implementation within a specific plantation organizational context by focusing on the transition from compliance-oriented practices to sustainability-oriented commitment. Using survey data from an ISPO-certified plantation in West Kalimantan and applying partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM), the study tests a mediation model linking green training effectiveness, sustainable work environment, and environmental compliance transparency to certification outcomes through corporate environmental commitment. The results show that Corporate Environmental Commitment fully mediates the effects of Green Training Effectiveness and Sustainable Work Environment on ISPO Implementation Success, indicating that organizational conditions contribute to certification effectiveness only when they are translated into governance commitment. In contrast, Environmental Compliance Transparency does not significantly influence commitment formation or certification outcomes. These findings suggest that effective certification implementation depends less on procedural compliance and more on the internalization of environmental priorities into organizational governance routines. The study contributes to the environmental governance literature by demonstrating that sustainability certification effectiveness emerges through governance internalization processes rather than through organizational practices alone.