A future with or without palm oil?
Published by Nederland Voedselland –
A future with palm oil seems self-evident. Palm oil is found in countless food products. You can find it in margarine, cookies, crisps and sauces and many other food products. It’s also used in cosmetics and cleaning products, thus, is a very useful substance – but not one without controversy. A link to deforestation. Or is that an unjust claim? Should we replace palm oil with another substance, or should we focus even more on using palm oil – but then in a more sustainable way? And how should consumers choose between sustainable palm oil or an alternative? What does our future with or without palm oil entail?
What should you, as a consumer, think of palm oil?
It is used in countless food products – but it also bears an image of burnt down rainforests and fleeing orang-utans. The sentiment was so strong, that a Dutch businessman sensed a gap in the market last year with the margarine brand The Flower Farm. The stylish black packaging read “Eat plants, not palm please”. The spread is made from sunflower oil and shea butter amongst other things. The Dutch Advertising Code Committee did not approve of this anti-palm-sentiment and made The Flower Farm remove the claim that consumers could save the rainforest by using Flower Farm margarine from their packaging. However, that doesn’t let palm oil off the hook. Should consumers avoid using palm oil altogether?
“Of course, I am suspicious”
“The palm oil we use in the Netherlands is sustainable and deforestation-free” according to Frans Claassen, Director of MVO, the chain organisation for oils and fats. “In the Netherlands, you are not able to buy margarine that consists of palm oil which has been produced through deforestation.”
Read the entire article here.
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