Cannot render .rmd missing pandoc

Describe the bug
I'm trying to render a simple .Rmd file in VSCode but it keeps telling me
Error: pandoc version 1.12.3 or higher is required and was not found (see the help page ?rmarkdown::pandoc_available).

To Reproduce
For testing purposes I tried to render a markdown with only one cell

1+1

with the same result.
When I try to render the same Markdown in RStudio it works without problems. Pandoc is installed under /usr/local/bin/pandoc and executing pandoc -v shows the correct version. When I open a radian shell in VSCode and type rmarkdown::pandoc_version() it also shows the correct version.
The command that VSCode executes it
rmarkdown::render('[path to file]/Chap04.Rmd', encoding = 'UTF-8')

Expected behavior
VSCode should render the markdown just as RStudio does.

Environment (please complete the following information):

• OS: macOS
• VSCode Version: 1.64.0
• R Version: 4.1.2
• vscode-R version: 2.3.6
• pandoc version: 2.17.1.1

Additional context
I tried the various other solutions to this problem such as setting the RSTUDIO_PANDOC variable but without any luck.

No repository file or test is named. First reproduce the failure with the reported rmarkdown::render command, compare it with rmarkdown::pandoc_version(), and trace the vscode-R rendering entry point. Done means rendering the same .Rmd succeeds in VSCode with the installed Pandoc version.