The ever-increasing use of palm oil as a food additive and biodiesel component is stirring up a lot of emotive contention between the green lobby and palm oil producers. The massive expansion of the industry has attracted a lot of negative attention in recent years, primarily because of the impacts that it’s seen to have on the rainforest and the species that inhabit it. Palm oil is found in a huge variety of products that we eat, drink, and use to make ourselves look and smell nice, which has been the primary driver for its large and rapid growth in production over the last decade.
Please don’t get me wrong; this article isn’t intended to be a platfom for having a pop at the palm oil industry. I want to take an objective look at the problem; explain what palm oil is, what it’s used for and highlight the impacts of palm oil plantations. Almost any pro-green organisation you can imagine is against palm oil, but I do want to look at this in an impartial manner. Therefore, I also want to answer the questions; if not palm oil, then what do we use? If we do use something different, what will that be, and could there be any consequences associated with that?
What is palm oil?
Palm oil is a vegetable oil obtained from the fruit of the oil palm tree. These trees are highly efficient at producing fruit all year round, with fully mature fruit clusters weighing in at about 50kg and each containing 50% oil. The main reason palm oil is such a desirable product is because of its high-yielding crop; oil palm trees require about 10 times less land for cultivation than similar oil producing varieties, such as rapeseed and sunflower oils, [1] arguably making it a greener alternative to these other products. As such, palm oil makes up about 60% of global vegetable oil yields, with production predicted to reach nearly 47 million tonnes in 2010. [2]
Palm oil is not only a cheap vegetable oil, but is also high in saturated fats, providing food producers with a means to replace the trans fats in their products. This highlights palm oil as a healthy alternative and explains another reason for the high demand, as the trans fats being replaced are closely associated with heart disease.
It is estimated that 50% of packaged products on supermarket shelves contain palm oil, [3] which shows just how much is being consumed. If you look closely you will find palm oil in peanut butter, bread, margarine, soap, lipstick, shaving foam, shampoo and even ice cream, to name but a few.
The problems
Deforestation is the number one issue here. At present 30 square miles of tropical rainforest are being destroyed everyday to make way for new palm oil plantations. [4] According to a UN report the natural rainforests of Sumatra and Borneo are being cleared so rapidly that up to 98% may be destroyed by 2022 [5]. This is due, in no small part, to the illegal logging and forest fires associated with the rapid expansion of palm oil plantations.
This deforestation has a number of impacts:
- Much of the forest is cleared by burning it; releasing vast amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere and contributing to global climate change. To compound the problem, the rainforests are the lungs of the world, breathing in CO2 and breathing out oxygen. A reduction in tropical rainforest is a reduction in the amount of CO2 we can remove from the atmosphere, right at the time when we need this eco-service the most.
- The peat bogs that much of the forests lie within are carbon sinks. As they dry out due to forest clearance, not only do they lose the capacity to draw carbon from the atmosphere, they also release huge amounts of carbon.
- Many local inhabitants rely on the rainforest for their day to day survival and have no way to stop their way of life going up in smoke (a topic the film Avatar covered quite well). Consequently they are forced from their homes and have to attempt a new start somewhere else, usually in a city.
Another major problem is that the rainforests being destroyed have a very high conservation value. They are the habitats for innumerable species, including tigers, elephants and orangutans. While it is very sad that these creatures – which are already facing extinction – are being killed because they have nowhere to shelter, hunt and reproduce, by far the saddest story of them all is that of the orangutan. This beautiful, peaceful primate has rapidly become the face of the anti-palm oil movement, and with good reason. The plantation owners see orangutans as a pest because they eat the oil palm fruit and consequently are being beaten, burnt, buried alive and hunted by the plantation workers. [6] The babies of those that are killed are often sold to the highest bidder; a few dollars or a wristwatch can buy you a baby orangutan. The orangutans that are rescued are currently destined to spend a life in captivity because the sanctuaries have no suitable land on which to release them – it’s all disappearing.
On the other side of the argument is the fact that thousands of farmers rely on the growth and export of palm oil, and if the Western world were to boycott this product they would lose their livelihoods. There is a difference though between a small-holding farmer growing a sustainable amount of palm oil and the mass clearance of land by a multinational corporation. Of course, another problem is; if not palm oil, then what?
The alternatives
In relation to the use of palm oil for biodiesel, a potential substitute to have been put forward is green algae, which could be grown on water thus avoiding the take-over of more land. [8] Also scientists have discovered Gliocladium Roseum, a fungus that could be cultivated to produce vehicle fuel. [9] Even so, as promising as these discoveries may be they are still in their infancy and won’t substitute the hunger for palm oil stemming from the food and cosmetic industries, which currently account for 70% of palm oil production.
The first and most obvious alternatives for food and cosmetic applications are the other oils that don’t need to be cultivated in tropical conditions (rapeseed, corn, sunflower). However, if we were to produce more of these oils, the problem of land clearance would be exacerbated because, as already mentioned, these oils require up to 10 times more land to farm them. Second, we then would also encounter another well-publicised concern – genetic modification (GM). It has been proved that GM crops can raise yields quite significantly, lowering the amount of land required for agriculture and the need to use so many pesticides. GM has also been very successful with crops such as rapeseed oil. So, GM crops in one form or another are an alternative, albeit not one I’m advocating. Worryingly, we are also staring to see GM palm oil developed in Indonesia, but that’s some time away yet [7].
The most tenable mitigation to this issue is that of certified sustainable palm oil (CSPO). Sustainable palm oil production is overseen by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) and certification criteria include: transparency of reporting environmental, social and legal issues; compliance with local, national and international laws; consideration of local/native forest inhabitants; best practice agricultural methods; a mitigation of negative environmental impacts. [10] Unfortunately though, according to Greenpeace it seems that many RSPO members are taking no steps to avoid the worst practices associated with the industry (and) the RSPO actually risks creating the illusion of sustainable palm oil, justifying the expansion of the palm oil industry. [11]
Nonetheless, the creating of the CSPO could help smaller growers by setting up a system similar to that of the Rainforest Alliance or Fairtade organisations, where farmers are offered support and incentives to grow their crops in harmony with the rainforest. For these to work though, there has to be significant investment and legislation to assist the governments of the growing nations.
What can we do as consumers to stop the problem?
- Don’t buy products that contain palm oil. Although this may appear as simple as reading an ingredients label and returning any offending product back to the shelf, that’s not the case. As a conscientious shopper I know that this solution is next to impossible, especially when palm oil is often described simply as ‘vegetable oil’. However, consumer demand is a very powerful weapon and one that we should use. I’m not suggesting a boycott of palm oil (if only I had the power), but just a little discretion when out shopping; remember, one small something by lots of people equals one big something on the global platform. To highlight an example of how companies can make a difference, think about this: one use for palm oil is that it makes products creamier. If enough people stop buying products on the basis of this (arguably unnecessary) content of palm oil, then we could see these producers either reducing the creaminess of their products or perhaps start using something else to add texture; like cream perhaps.
- Buy products that display palm oil from sustainable sources. The Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF) has produced a scorecard on the companies they feel are leading the way in the purchase and use of certified sustainable palm oil. Highest scorers include Sainsbury’s, Marks & Spencer, Young’s/Findus, Unilever, Cadbury, The Body Shop and Asda, who are all now using some CSPO in their products [8]. These are the kind of indicators that we as consumers can use to help us make informed decisions and thus hopefully make a difference.
In summary then…
In regard to energy crops, we need to stop the expansion of palm oil and seek other alternatives, because what’s happening now is wrong. However, in the case of food oil, the situation is far from clear-cut. Palm oil represents the most efficient oil-producing crop we have, but the growth of it wreaks havoc on the environment. There are no viable alternatives that can replace palm oil, at least not without creating problems of their own. For now the best we can hope for is a change in the practices employed by the growers to more sustainable and ethical methods, which we as consumers can demand.
I started this article with my objective head on and aimed to give a totally impartial view of the palm oil situation, but what I have seen and read during my research has shocked and upset me. Like I said earlier, I don’t want to use this as means of having a moan at the palm oil industry, and I really wish I could offer a better way to address the issue as a consumer, but I can’t. If this is the first you have heard of this problem – which I doubt it is – then please read more and do what you can. The scope of this issue is huge, so do go online and have a look at the plethora of articles out there on the subject, or read some of the ones highlighted below. Whether it be stopping tropical deforestation, saving the orangutan or preventing climate change, we can all do our bit. Thanks for listening.
References
[1] http://www.greenpalm.org/en/about-palm-oil/what-is-palm-oil
[2] http://www.economist.com/node/16423833
[3]http://www.wwf.org.uk/news_feed.cfm?3427/Companies_could_do_better_on_palm_oil
[5] www.unep-wcmc.org/resources/publications/LastStand.htm
[6] http://www.born-to-be-wild.org/html/palm_oil.html
[7] http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/oil-on-troubled-water-611158.html
[8] http://www.energysavingwarehouse.co.uk/news/97/20/A-New-Breed-of-Biofuels.html
[10] http://www.rspo.org
