By Lucille Chi •
July 15, 2009
So what is the problem with palm oil? Take a peek at this short video explaining:
To recap, palm oil is in many common supermarket products such as snacks, candy, and even soaps and detergents. Rainforest Action Network has created a site to educate consumers on the how destructive palm oil is to our global environment. Palm oil destroys vital ecosystems, contributes to global climate change, results in the displacement of Indigenous people and small family farmers, and is produced through exploitative labor practices.
Please help educate grocery shoppers about these facts and take action in anyway possible. RAN tells us: “Palm oil plantations are expanding into the planet’s most biodiverse ecosystems, including rainforests, grasslands and peat swamps in South America, Southeast Asia, the Pacific and Africa. These regions are home to millions of plant and animal species, including highly endangered orangutans, clouded leopards, and sun bears.”
Big palm oil companies pay to have important oxygen providing rainforests clear cut for their palm crops and painfully push out the native people that rely on the land. This endangers the plants, animals and waterways that entire communities have thrived on forever.
By Gavin Hudson •
August 6, 2008
Malaysia and Indonesia decided this week to convert surpluses of edible palm oil into biodiesel fuel.
Currently, the two southeast Asian countries grow about 85% of the world’s palm oil and control 88% of all palm oil exports. But amid stalled plans for more production plants and a slowing demand for palm oil, the countries are beginning to worry.
The proposal to turn so much food to fuel comes as an attempt to increase demand for palm biodiesel and drive up prices. In 2007, palm oil biodiesel prices made a dizzying 80% jump to over $944 per tonne. However, when prices hit today’s price of $871 per tonne lags just below prices seven months ago.
By Gavin Hudson •
January 15, 2008
Some environmentalists see palm oil, which makes up about one third of all vegetable oil, as a biodiesel blessing. Others blame palm biodiesel for deforestation and species extinction. The pros and cons make biodiesel one of the hottest environmental topics in Southeast Asia, where oil palms grow.
Together, the Southeast Asian countries of Indonesia and Malaysia control about 85% of the world’s crude palm oil market. In Indonesia, the biodiesel industry employs 1.5 million people and Malaysia has already approved 91 new biodiesel plants. Currently, about 30% of Malaysia’s total oil production is biodiesel from palm oil.
The pros of palm oil for use in biodiesel have drawn interest from the international business community. Finnish biodiesel mogul, Neste Oil, is working on opening the world’s largest biodiesel plant in Singapore using a palm oil feedstock. The plant is set to go online in 2009 with a production capacity of 800,000 metric tons per year of biodiesel–16,000 barrels, in oil terms. Neste is followed by many other companies, including Australian Mission Biofuels, which opened a new Malaysian plant in December and will produce 100,000 tons a year.
