Palm oil is an oil bestseller. It is cheap, easy to cultivate and versatile. The fact that it only grows in tropical areas does not seem to cause a problem for food giants. They surely know how to carefully deal with centuries-old rainforests: destroy them and make room for agriculture’s jack-of-all-trades palm oil. But cutting down old-growth forests has a great impact on our climate. Peatlands in the forests of Indonesia and Malaysia store ten times more carbon dioxide per hectare than other forests. For the sake of palm oil, forests as large as 300 soccer fields are destroyed every minute, releasing significant amounts of carbon dioxide.
Large-scale monoculture palm oil plantations now cover 15 million hectares of former rainforest areas. Growing the same crops on the same areas for a number of years naturally results in exhausted soil. Pests and other plant diseases can consequently spread much easier and quicker. Palm oil cultivated in monocultures is everything but organic or fair trade. If producers do not want to sustain losses of their palm oil harvest, they use pesticides which cause water contamination.
The destruction of primary forests is a threat to vulnerable species. Many of the about 300,000 animals found in Indonesia and Malaysia are either killed or forced to move their habitats due to deforestation. The decreasing amount of forests pushes animals such as the orangutan and the Sumatran tiger to the brink of extinction. If big businesses in the food industry do not change their methods for growing palm oil, some endangered species will no longer be with us. Unless animals will not be bothered by the pesticides used on plantations, they will most likely not return to their former habitats. So far, palm oil plants do not offer quite as much privacy for animals than rainforests.
But not only animals are affected by palm oil plantations. Of course, big food businesses bear nothing else in mind than bringing development to poor regions. Who knew that indigenous people would take this exceptional offer of boosting up their lifestyle the wrong way? Expelling indigenous people and small farmers can certainly be described as a “development”, just not exactly as a positive one. The Indonesian government for instance grants land which indigenous people inhabit to companies which use this land to grow palm oil plants.
Fortunately, the Round Table on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) was formed in 2004. But isn’t it funny that the association is chaired by a manager of the high street name Unilever? Members of the RSPO include Nestlé, Cadbury and Unilever – the world’s largest palm oil consumers. More than 200 environmental and human rights organizations lambaste the RSPO label for their empty promises. The RSPO does not prohibit destructing secondary forests; only primary ones will be protected. According to RSPO criteria, no primary forests have been destroyed since 2008 for sustainable palm oil. That means that palm oil is labeled “sustainable” even if the plants grow on areas where secondary forests have been cleared or even primary forests before 2008. I would not want to call that sustainable.
If we change our fast-paced lifestyle of eating and substitute convenience food or prepackaged meals for fresh products, we can eliminate the chance of buying palm oil. What about products which we cannot prepare ourselves, like chocolate? Fair trade companies such as GEPA do not use any form of vegetable oil in their chocolates. Alternatively, we as consumers can always scan the ingredients list on the back of products and make sure that no palm oil is included. We have the choice. We can either support the consequences of palm oil plantations or boycott palm oil.