PALM OIL IMPACT
Palm oil is found in over half all packaged items on
our supermarket shelves, from snack foods to soaps Demand is still growing, as are oil palm
plantations... but at what price to tropical forests and the biodiversity found
there?
Global
production of palm oil has doubled over the last decade. By 2000, palm oil was
the most produced and traded vegetable oil, accounting for 40% of all vegetable
oils traded internationally. By 2006, the percentage had risen to 65%.
Worldwide demand for palm oil is expected to double again by 2050 to 240
million tonnes. New plantations are being developed and existing ones are being
expanded in Indonesia, Malaysia and other Asian countries, as well as in Africa
and Latin America.
The
establishment of vast monoculture oil plam plantations has a number of serious
environmental impacts like large-scale forest conversion
and the loss of critical habitat for
endangered species. Indonesia is home to
some of the most rich and biodiverse rainforest in the world. It contains over
80 endemic species and some of the world’s most unique and iconic endangered
wildlife such as the orangutan, elephant and tiger. But these animals are
in grave danger. Every hour 300 football fields of precious remaining forest is
being ploughed to the ground across South East Asia to make way for palm oil
plantations.
In the last 20 years, over 3.5 million hectares of
Indonesian and Malaysian forest have been destroyed to make way for palm oil. Almost
80% of orangutan habitat has disappeared in the last 20 years. We are losing
over 6,000 orangutans a year. There are now only 400 Sumatran tigers left in
the world.
New plantations can
also create social conflicts if the rights and livelihoods of local communities
are ignored. Not only can this cause negative external impacts but it can also
affect the companies involved, and hamper the ability of the companies to
expand as planned.
In recent years, the world’s biggest companies have woken up to the
environmental costs associated with palm oil and the other commodities they
buy.
In 2015,
Indonesia was wracked by the worst forest fires for almost twenty years. The
disaster, the result of decades of forest and peatland destruction, thrust
Indonesia’s plantation industries into the global spotlight. Most companies are
unable even to say how much of their palm oil comes from suppliers that comply
with their own sourcing standards. Some companies reviewed were:
Colgate-Palmolive, Ikea, Johnson & Johnson, Kellogg, PepsiCo, Starbucks...
How can you
help?
-Buy sustainable palm oil products
-Sign
petitions like:
https://secure3.convio.net/gpeace/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=1885&s_src=actions
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