Why we actively fight palm oil:
Basic arguments and explanations about the substance that destroys the rainforest
Palm oil plays a decisive role in the lives of almost everyone of us. Being a low-cost resource, palm oil is in great demand and is contained in virtually everything. You can find it in foods ranging from frozen pizza to chocolate bars, in laundry detergents and cleaning agents, in cosmetics, in diesel fuel tanks and in combined heat and power plants. Here are some facts about palm oil you may have been unaware of.
1. From the rainforest to palm oil monocultures
The oil palm tree (Elaeis guineensis) grows to 30 metres tall and is native to the African rainforest. As of today, oil palms are bred in industrial plantations embracing an area of 15 million hectares along the equator. Oil palm trees depend on the tropical rainforest climate to flourish: They rely on constant high humidity, high temperatures and full sun. In order to guarantee this, the ground is cleared of its natural vegetation when establishing a plantation. Huge amounts of pesticides and herbicides are employed to kill off weeds and vermin on the monocultivated fields. At oil mills, the oil is extracted from the fruit using heat and high pressure. Palm oil is gained from the pulp of the orange-coloured fruit, while the kernel contains palm kernel oil. Per year in a hectare, oil palm trees yield about 3,5 tons of raw palm oil on the average.
2. Clear-cutting the rainforest in favour of palm oil
Together, Indonesia and Malaysia account for 85 per cent of the global palm oil production. In Indonesia alone, oil palms are grown on an area of 9 million hectares. But aside from these nations, Germany also imports large quantities from Colombia, Papua New Guinea and Ivory Coast. Governments grant big concessions on rainforest land to corporations. What is more, the tropical timber and palm oil industries are closely intertwined. Felling and selling precious wood often serves to finance the investment costs for palm oil plantations. The rest of the forest vegetation is simply burned.
3. Palm oil plantations are the enemy of biodiversity
Following deforestation and transformation of the rainforests into industrial monocultures, the most species-rich habitats on earth are destroyed. According to experts, the destruction of tropical forests is responsible for more than 50.000 animal and plant species to become extinct per year. Orangutans, Sumatran tigers and elephants are among the highly endangered species. But the people who live there lose their livelihoods as well. Natives and farmers are driven off their land; herbicides and waste from the oil mill factories pollute their soil, their rivers and their lakes.
4. Palm oil brings large profits to corporations
Palm oil is by far the cheapest vegetable oil on the world market. In large quantities, it is traded internationally. Worldwide annual production in 2010: 53 million tons. Owing to its chemical property, palm oil proves to be very versatile in food and chemical industries. Because of its high melting point, it is supple and easy to spread. It is vitally important for many products.
5. Palm oil in the supermarket
Palm oil is an integral part in thousands of grocery store products. But only few manufacturers – mostly producers in the organic sector – label the palm oil contained in their products on the packaging. Most companies try to disguise this fact and put down “vegetable oils and fats” instead. Products that usually contain palm oil:
Foods: margarine, frozen pizza, any convenience food, ice cream, biscuits, chocolate spread, cereal bars, potato crisps. Even when it comes to yoghurt, the milkfat is replaced by palm oil in some cases. The food industry makes excessive use of it and is by far the largest processor of palm oil.
Chemical products: detergents, soaps, household cleaners, candles, beauty products (creams, lipsticks).
6. Palm oil from the outlet
350.000 tons – more than a quarter of all German imports of palm oil which amount to 1,2 million tons (current number from 2009) – are burned in so-called block heat and power plants in order to generate electricity and heat. By means of the Renewable Energy Source Act (EEG), the Federal Government promotes this with up to 19 cents per kilowatt hour. Palm oil combustion is financed via an “EEG Apportionment” scheme which is included in the monthly bill of every single customer. However, 500 of the largest industrial consumers of electricity are excluded from this.
7. Palm oil in your fuel tank
Binding statutes in Germany and in the EU lay down that petroleum diesel must be blended with 6,25 per cents of the so-called pure biodiesel (2010). Samplings by Greenpeace at German gas stations confirm that instead of biodiesel palm oil is used to a great extent.
8. Palm oil warms the climate
Global warming is fuelled by palm oil dramatically. In the acts of clear-cutting the rainforest and draining the peatlands, huge amounts of carbon are released. Because of the deforestation of its rainforest, Indonesia comes in third place at being responsible for warming the climate (after China and the US). In order to cultivate palm oil, large quantities of fossil energy are spent on tillage, fertilizer, pesticides, harvesting, transport and processing. Methane, a very strong greenhouse gas, escapes the production residues. So, energy from palm oil is never “climate neutral”.
9. Palm oil makes you sick
Palm oil is half saturated fat that can cause high cholesterol and heart diseases and that is decried as fattening.
Apart from that, palm oil also contains the so-called fatty acid ester (3-MCPD and glycidol fatty acid esters) which international science committees classify as being carcinogenic. These fatty acid esters arise in the process of refining vegetable fats and oils. So far, the highest values have been detected in refined palm oil. Glycidol fatty acid esters can be broken down during digestion and can release glycidol.
For a long time, refined vegetable fats are used for the fat content in foods. Even chocolate spreads usually contain a lot of palm oil. Since the health risk depends on the amount absorbed and on the body weight, especially children are at risk.
10. “Organic” palm oil is not the solution
Companies in the organic sector rely heavily on palm oil. More than 400 products by well-known manufacturers such as Alnatura, Allos, Rapunzel, The Body Shop etc. contain palm oil. Rainforest Rescue has discovered that their suppliers, the Daabon-group in Colombia, have a history of serious accidents, water wastage, pollution, deforestation and eviction of peasants. Here, too, monocultivated fields stretch out over thousands of hectares. From Rainforest Rescue’s point of view, these monocultures do not deserve an eco-label certifying “ecological” farming at all.
11. Palm oil label is a fraud
In collaboration with the WWF, the big palm oil producers and processors have formed the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO). It is the goal of this association to help develop a new acceptance for the discredited palm oil by means of a new “label” and to establish more and more palm oil plantations. RSPO does not even rule out deforestation; social aspects and climate protection are ignored completely. 256 environmental and human rights organisations dismiss RSPO and accuse the association of false labelling.
12. What you can do
Note whether the products you purchase contain palm oil. If the packaging merely indicates “vegetable oils”, please contact the manufacturer.
If you want to avoid palm oil, do not buy convenience food. Use seasonal products from your region instead. Apart from that, all we can do is recommend to be more careful and economical when it comes to our resources.
Send letters to the Federal Government and to the EU. Ask them to put a stop to palm oil imports immediately, to cancel allowances for electricity produced from vegetable oil and to repeal the mandatory biodiesel-blending. Food must not be burned for the sake of energy.
Furthermore, you can participate in our signature campaign directed at Chancellor Angela Merkel. You can download it from our website at www.regenwald.org/Unterschriften
Rainforest Rescue
supports the rainforest fighters on the ground financially and collects donations to this end. Everyone is also free to participate in the activities and campaigns announced on our website www.rainforest-rescue.org: We collect signatures for protest letters addressed to politicians and corporations in order to protect human rights and to stop the destruction of nature.
Contact:
Rainforest Rescue (Rettet den Regenwald e.V.)
Jupiterweg 15, 22391 Hamburg, Germany
Phone: +49 (0) 40 – 410 38 04
info@regenwald.org
www.rainforest-rescue.org