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While orang-utan-lovers and environmentalists fight to get their voices heard at the 5th Roundtable Meeting on Sustainable Palm Oil (RT5) conference in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Sainsbury's has made its own little contribution to the affair: from May 2008 the supermarket retailer will start using sustainable palm oil in some of its own products.
The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), which is hosting the RT5, is a group of over 250 organisations and companies that has been working on initiatives to make the palm oil industry less harmful to the planet, people and animals. The group has just announced that there will be an official certification for sustainable palm oil.
Melanie Etches from Sainsbury's, which will be the first UK supermarket to adopt the certification system, told SmartPlanet that the first two products containing only sustainable palm oil will be Sainsbury's Basics fish fingers and a new soap range.
"We wanted to start with ordinary products many people buy and which contain a considerable amount of palm oil," she said.
When we asked Etches why Sainsbury's isn't making a full switch to sustainable palm oil right off the bat, she explained that they've only sourced enough of the planet- and organ-utan-friendly stuff for the fish fingers and the soap range.
But eventually they're planning on it -- at least for every Sainsbury's brand product that uses palm oil. Etches said the supermarket is finding more sustainable sources and will know in February 2008 when they'll be able to make the sweeping change.
Personally, we're keen on the switch. One in ten food and beauty products contains palm oil, and millions of hectares of our precious rainforests are being cleared to make space for oil palm plantations, displacing endangered animals like orang-utans and destroying biodiversity in the process.
So making the industry sustainable would be a huge benefit. Good news all around for rainforests, local communities and those of us consuming palm oil.
22 November 2007 06:29pm
As Director of the Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation UK and member of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil along with Sainsbury's, I applaud this announcement and hope that other retailers and manufacturers who use palm oil will make the same commitment. The orangutans and countless other species depend upon it.
Michelle Desilets
Director
Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation UK
23 November 2007 10:31am
There is massive doubt among green groups (like FoE and Greenpeace) over the RSPO's 'sustainable palm' claims. These 'guidelines' are just that--unenforceable guidelines with little traceability. The challenge facing the forests of south east asia are almost insurmountable given that the global demand for palm oil is so high. The best way to help this situation would be for retailers to REDUCE or ELIMINATE palm from their products altogether. I'm sure that's a statement that the Director of the Borneo Organutan Survival Foundation would get behind. Good on Sainsburys for looking into the issue, but it'd be best to wash their hands of palm oil completely.
24 November 2007 12:48pm
While we, The Borneo Orangutan Survival (BOS) Foundation UK, sit on the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil in the effort to promote that what palm oil is produced will someday be produced more sustainably, we certainly feel the best solution would be to not use palm oil altogether. For consumers, it is so difficult for them to choose products without palm oil or its derivatives. Vague labeling as vegetable oil does not help, and for every day consumers to be educated about all the names that palm oil can be described as, especially in beauty care products, is a tall order. And to expect consumers to read through ingredients labels on so many products is unrealistic.
Palm oil will continue to be produced in South East Asia, and manufacturers and retailers will continue to use it. We believe it is best to campaign for the most sustainable practices in the production of palm oil in these cases, whilst indeed supporting bold efforts to eliminate the use of palm oil altogether in products, such as the Lush company are proposing to do.
Michelle Desilets
Director
Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation
03 January 2008 12:43pm
Why must only palm oil be sustainbale? Because it came from South East Asia? What about soy? What about rapeseed, corn and other vegetable oil? Malaysia, on one of the leading palm oil producers, uses only 4 million hectares of land to meet the demand of the world! They dont need to clear more lands. All they do is scientifically increase the yield per hectare, to increase volume, zero burning policies where they reuse old trees as fertilizers for the new ones, biological control contributing to less use of fertilizers and pesticides, and many companies has won global award for effective plantation e.g Golden Hope Plantation. Oil palm trees are also normal trees - absorb carbon dioxide and releases oxygen! and in some studies, showed that oil palm is more effective than normal trees. Orang utan population is steady in Borneo. Why are you crucifying the whole industry because of some , very little bad apples? Which if you asked me is orchestrate by competitors of palm oil. We all know this. Yes, you and I know it Sean, Michelle. Lets talk about other crops that plants on a far larger acrage as compared to oil palm and produces far less? Do they need to be sustainable? Why only palm oil? Because orang utan do not exists in America / Europe? You killed bisons, foxes, yetties for all I care but do you have sustainable practices? Or at least effort and initiative to turn sustainable? Why dont you suggest we stop using soy and rapeseed and corn Sean? Why palm oil? Because it's ok if the Asian farmers dies but it's a tragic that Caucasian farmers dies? Palm oil has been the main support to eradicate poverty in most of these countries. It deserve the same treatment, if not better because of its nutritional attributes, economical attributes, but more importantly, because of the effort the industry and caountry is willing to put. So 'washing your hands of it' is not an intelligent remark.
04 January 2008 02:45pm
Why only palm oil need to be from a sustainable source? Other crops too uses million of hectares of land. Deforestation occurred there too i.e soybean, rapeseed. For all we care, foxes, bisons, birds lost their habitats too. Indonesian have farmers that needed food and shelter too and palm oil give them just that - eradicate poverty. Why the discrimination Sean? So European farmers can get richer when EU only uses their oil as biofuel? UK is far more inferior in forest coverage to land area as compared to Malaysia and Indonesia. Why can Malaysia and Indonesia uses their land for economic purposes while the same reserved oxygen is then enjoyed by people in Europe? We don't live to serve you while we have to satisfy with 1 meager meal a day. Think about it.
04 January 2008 02:57pm
Malaysia for example only uses 4 million hectares of land to back then become the world's biggest palm oil exporter. Palm oil yield per land area is far more superior than any other crops. Not to mention nutritional attributes with trans-fat proved to be the number 1 killer rather than saturated fats. Oil palm, like other trees absorbs C02 and releases O2 - according to some research, oil palm is more efficient. This is the solution for global warming, rising fossil oil prices, and feeding the world! Open wide, both eyes and mind to see the truth, rather than being manipulated and fed by false description of what's actually happening. In fact, Malaysia has plantation companies that won global awards for good plantation management! No doubt some did not go by the rule, especially in Indonesia it's too big to have proper policing, but it's too few. Too few to comprehensively crucify the whole palm oil industry especially with the effort that they tried to put up. What about other vegetable oil? Do they have sustainability effort? Is it as massive as palm oil initiatives? I don't think so.
24 January 2008 11:13am
Palm oil is not the way forward!!! - I watched this heart wrenching program on BBC 2 'TRIBE' by Bruce Parry on the devastating effects the Palm oil industry is having on the environment and the people living within the area it has been produced.
The Penan tribe had a lot to say about the palm industry (please see link)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/tribe/tribes/penan/index.shtml
It is plain to see what goes on in the 'background' is masked by the ill-conceived idea that this could ever be eco-friendly or sustainable product.
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