Palm Oil

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Palm Oil Factsheet

Palm oil touches our lives every time we take a trip to the supermarket. Palm oil and its derivatives are used in a ubiquitous array of packaged foods, including ice cream, cookies, crackers, chocolate products, cereals, breakfast bars, cake mixes, doughnuts, potato chips, instant noodles, frozen sweets and meals, baby formula, margarine, and dry and canned soups.

Truth and Consequences: Palm Oil Plantations Push Unique Orangutan Population to Brink of Extinction

A manmade inferno inside the globally renowned Tripa rainforest in Aceh, Indonesia is pushing this forest’s unique population of Sumatran orangutans to the brink of extinction. Destruction inside palm oil plantation leases is driving the end of this great lowland forest, despite years of efforts by local communities to defend their forests and livelihood.

Girl Scouts and Palm Oil

When they were just eleven years old, Michigan Girl Scouts Madison Vorva and Rhiannon Tomtishen discovered an alarming fact while completing research for their Girl Scout Bronze Awards: most Girl Scout cookies are packed with palm oil, an ingredient that causes the destruction of irreplaceable rainforests and threatens the survival of humankind’s closest relative, orangutans.

Undesired Consequences of the Industrial Food Complex

The connection between deforestation-related emissions and agricultural expansion is well documented. According to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), agriculture and deforestation account for roughly one third of global greenhouse gas emissions from human activities. Take for example, the rapid expansion of three globally-traded agricultural commodities into tropical rainforests: soy, palm oil and cattle.

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Truth and Consequences: Palm Oil Plantations Push Unique Orangutan Population to Brink of Extinction
A manmade inferno inside the globally renowned Tripa rainforest in Aceh, Indonesia is pushing this forest’s unique population of Sumatran orangutans to the brink of extinction. Destruction inside palm oil plantation leases is driving the end of this great lowland forest, despite years of efforts by local communities to defend their forests and livelihood.
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Recent Blog Posts

Why ‘RSPO Sustainable Palm Oil’ is not responsible

When you go to the grocery store and you buy a bag of chips, a chocolate bar, crackers, ice-cream, doughnuts, frozen snacks or other candy, you may see a label on the products saying ‘RSPO Certified Sustainable Palm Oil’ or ‘Green Palm Sustainability.’ Such labeling makes it is easy to think that the product you are holding contains palm oil that has been produced responsibly.

Indonesian Forest Protections Under Attack

An orangutan looks out from a cage in Aceh, Indonesia. The region’s Sumatran orangutans face extinction due to palm oil development. Photo: David Gilbert

The Last Stand of the Sumatran Orangutan

A stranded orangutan watches as her home is bulldozed.

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Take Action Today

Stand With RAN!
I stand with RAN in calling on the US snack food industry to help stop the destruction of Indonesia's rainforests for palm oil.

Publications

Truth and Consequences: Palm Oil Plantations Push Unique Orangutan Population to Brink of Extinction
A manmade inferno inside the globally renowned Tripa rainforest in Aceh, Indonesia is pushing this forest’s unique population of Sumatran orangutans to the brink of extinction. Destruction inside palm oil plantation leases is driving the end of this great lowland forest, despite years of efforts by local communities to defend their forests and livelihood.
Cargill's Problems With Palm Oil
This report documents systemic failures in agribusiness giant Cargill's supply chain.
Duta Palma: Case Study of a Palm Oil Supplier in Indonesia
A case study on Duta Palma Nusantara, one of Indonesia’s top ten oil palm producers, whose dirty operations are threatening the country's rich rainforests.
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