Unilever and Nestlé are burning Indonesia. Is “sustainable palm oil” a con?
At the moment, fires burning across Indonesia since July have destroyed over burned 8,578 square kilometers (3,304 square miles and around the size of Puerto Rico) as of the end of September, blanketing the islands in thick toxic smoke which has turned the sky a violent red. Although the government has not directly admitted so, reports claim the fires are due to slash and burn techniques to clear forests for agriculture—namely palm oil plantations.
According to the United Nations, nearly 10 million children are at risk due to air pollution from the fires, which have raged since July and are calculated to have released 360 million tonnes of carbon dioxide between August 1 and September 18. In Malaysia and Indonesia, hundreds of schools have also been closed because of air pollution concerns. Slash and burn in these areas are especially harmful because as the trees are burned, they not only release carbon dioxide stored within the plants but also within the fertile and carbon-rich peatland. Especially during a long dry season, forests in these areas are highly combustible, releasing toxic fumes. At the same time, these fires are destroying the valuable habitat of critically endangered species like the Sumatran orangutans and rhinos.
Indonesia produces nearly half of the world’s palm oil, mostly stemming from unsustainable practices. According to an Indonesian government audit released on August 23, more than 80 percent of palm oil plantations were using illegal practices and were not in compliance with national sustainability standards.
According to a shocking report by GreenPeace, the palm oil traders responsible for the Indonesian fires— including Wilmar, Cargill, Musim Mas, and Golden-Agri Resources—have all traded to the global market. According to the Indonesia-based Centre for International Forestry Research, these four companies are said to have supplied more than three-quarters of the world’s palm oil in 2015. Out of the 30 producer groups most linked to Indonesian fires, Nestle has bought from 28 of them, Unilever from at least 27, and P&G from at least 22, the report alleged.
This is not even the first time palm oil plantations have been the root cause for fires in Indonesia. In 2015, there was an equally devastating fire which spread in Sumatra, Kalimantan and Papua and, according to a report by the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, caused an estimated 100,000 premature deaths.
Palm oil has been the center of a growing debate over how staple foods contribute to deforestation and carbon emissions. Most notably, palm oil, which can be found in bread, chocolate, shampoo, and many more household products, has been attributed as being especially harmful to the environment. Found in nearly half of all grocery store items, palm oil has become a ubiquitous component of the global food trade.
Established in 2004, the Roundtable for Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) by the World Wildlife Fund has been monitoring the development of certified sustainable palm oil (CSPO) and creating regulations for what is defined as sustainable. According to their website, the roundtable includes representatives from “7 sectors of the palm oil industry: oil palm producers, processors or traders, consumer goods manufacturers, retailers, banks/investors, and environmental and social non-governmental organizations (NGOs), to develop and implement global standards for sustainable palm oil.”
However, even at the RSPO genesis, there was controversy that their guidelines did not take into account the amount of emissions (carbon dioxide, methane, etc.) produced by palm oil production. Also, only in November 2018 did the organization finally decide to ban its members from destroying rainforests in order to create palm oil plantations. However, according to reports, these rules have yet to be enforced properly. The convoluted and vague wording in the RSPO criteria has allowed companies significant leeway in determining which sources are “sustainable.”
According to Roberto Gatti, author of a lead study on palm oil plantations, “sustainable palm oil” simply does not exist because any operation will involve some aspect of deforestation.
“Our research shows quite unequivocally that, unfortunately, there is no way to produce sustainable palm oil that did not come from deforestation, and that the claims by corporations, certification schemes and non-government organizations are simply ‘greenwashing’, useful to continue business as usual,” he said. “No shortcuts: if you use palm oil, certified or not, you are definitely destroying tropical forests.”
However, there is a human aspect to the entire issue. The sector also employs about 6 million people worldwide, about 2.2 million of whom are smallholder farmers, often living at the edge of poverty and relying on palm oil to feed, shelter, and educate their families. Similar to the rainforest fires in Brazil, these farmers often believe they have a right to the forests as their singular source of income. On the other hand, palm oil plantations directly under corporate giants like Colgate, Nestlé and Unilever have been reported to systematically profit from child and forced labor. The disgusting conditions in which these children and women were forced to work in places the definition of “sustainable” under serious questioning.
“I don’t go to school…I carry the sack with the loose fruit by myself but can only carry it half full. It is difficult to carry it, it is heavy. I do it in the rain as well but it is difficult…My hands hurt and my body aches,” a ten-year old boy, who dropped out of school to help his father at a Wilmar supplier, said.
In the end, the word “sustainable” is a cop-out. Companies and the RSPO are hiding behind this word as forests are still burned, families are exploited, children are breathing in toxic fumes, and animals are shunted out of their habitats. At the same time, these corporate giants claim they’re helping the environment.
While some claim that palm oil is still a better alternative to other vegetable oils, which use more resources and land, there are ways to avoid vegetable oils all-together. Instead of buying processed foods that likely have palm oil from the grocery store, buying more localized oils and cutting fatty snack foods that contain palm oil are both reasonable solutions. Governments can also do their part by placing partial or complete bans on importing palm oil.
