It came to my attention not that long ago (sometimes I’m very behind in these things) that Palm Oil is one of the world’s largest ongoing environmental disasters and the primary destructive force behind the rapid extinction of the orangutan. The good news is, each and every one of us can help put a stop to it.
In order to plant palm trees that produce oil-rich seeds, virgin rain forest in Indonesia, Sumatra and Borneo is clear cut. What remains is burned. This sounds bad at the outset, when you just think about the trees, but much worse when you think about the animals that live there, including orangutans. They are the world’s largest tee-living primate, spending 90% of their time in the branches and not on the ground. Their homes are cut down, and they are subsequently killed by hand or by fire. Hundreds of orangutans are slaughtered this way and dozens of babies orphaned each month, leaving us with a bleak 62,000 left in the world. It is estimated that they will be extinct in under 20 years at our current rate of palm oil consumption and planting. The orangutans are the biggest looser in this proposition, but many other animals are also dying from loss of habitat, fire and outright killing, including Sumatran Tigers, Sumatran Rhinos, Pygmy Elephants and Bornean Red Carnivores.
The palm oil industry presents other environmental problems including air pollution, and according to PalmOilAction.org, “This year Indonesia will be included in the Guinness Book of Records as the country which pursues the highest annual rate of deforestation. Currently an area of forest equal to 300 soccer fields is being destroyed every hour in the country.” Three hundred soccer fields every hour is a hard thing for me to get my head around, but it’s enough to make me read my ingredients before I buy.
That’s the sneaky thing about palm oil – we are often unaware it’s in our products, from cosmetics, to food to biofuel. We all heard about the two girl scouts, Madison Vorva and Rhiannon Tomtishen, who made news by asking Kellogg Company, the makers of Girl Scout Cookies, to stop using palm oil in its famous brand; and I found several great resources full of information on other products using palm oil:
Other Ingredient Names Used to Describe Palm Oil:
- Sodium Laureth Sulphate (Can also be from coconut)
- Sodium Lauryl Sulphates (can also be from ricinus oil)
- Sodium dodecyl Sulphate (SDS or NaDS)
- Palmate
- Palm Oil Kernal
- Palmitate
- Palm Oil in Cosmetics
- Elaeis Guineensis
- Glyceryl Stearate
- Stearic Acid
- Chemicals containing palm oil
- Steareth -2
- Steareth -20
- Sodium Lauryl Sulphate
- Sodium lauryl sulfoacetate (coconut and/or palm)
- Hydrated palm glycerides
- Sodium isostearoyl lactylaye (derived from vegetable stearic acid)
- Cetyl palmitate and octyl palmitate (and anything with palmitate at the end) [1]
Foods/Brands Using Palm Oil:
- Balance Bar
- Ben & Jerry’s
- Check out our “Candy List”
- Clif Bar
- Enfamil Products
- Food Crisps
- GeniSoy
- Girl Scout Cookies
- Glenny’s
- Harmony Premium Trail Mix
- Harmony Yogurt Flavored Raisin Nut Mix
- Jell-O No Bake Homestyle Cheese Cake Desert
- Jewel Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Little Debbie
- Luna Bar
- McDonald’s
- Mercer Vanilla Waves
- Met-Rx
- Milk (various products may contain Vitamin A palmitate)
- Mrs. Fields
- Nissin Noodles / Ramen
- Odwalla Soy Milk
- Pepperidge Farm
- Power Bar
- Quaker
- Raspberry Danish Fine Baked Goods
- Russell Stover
- South Beach Diet foods
- Soy Milk (various)
- Sun Ridge Farms
- Sweet’N Low
- Sunshine Cheez-it
- Walkers Snacks
- Whole Foods brand pie
- WorldWide Sport Nutrition
- Zone Perfect [2]
- Accem Scott
- Aloette Cosmetics
- Avon
- Borghese
- Bumble & Bumble
- California Baby
- Channoine
- Clinique
- Cornelia
- Cover Girl
- Day & Night Minerals
- DebLynne Soaps
- Dial
- Dr. Bronner’s
- Earth Therapeutics
- Ecco Bella Botanical cosmetics
- Genome Cosmetique
- Herbal Essences
- Hoffmans House of Treasure
- Island Soap Company
- Isomers Laboratories (makeup)
- Jerome Alexander cosmetics
- Juice Beauty
- Kiss My Face Big Kiss Organic Palm Oil Soap
- Lancome
- La Serie (beauty products)
- Mary Kay
- MD Skincare
- Mountain Country
- Neutrogena
- One With Nature
- Palmer’s
- Prai Beauty Products
- Protameen
- Pur Minerals
- Regena Cell’s Anti-Aging Cream
- Revlon
- Sappo Hill Skin Care Products
- Senna Cosmetics
- Sensaria
- Sephora
- Skin Biology
- Skin Scope
- Soma Therapy products
- South of France
- Tasha and Co.
- Urban Decay cosmetics
- ZENMED [2]
“The Guilty Secrets of Palm Oil: Are You Unwittingly Contributing to the Devastation of the Rain Forests”
Palm Oil: An Environmentalists Perspective
How You Can Help or Take Action:
Great Ape Trust
Centre For Orangutan Protection
Orangutan Conservancy
- Jocelyn Broyles
[1] All data on palm oil alternative names taken verbatim from PalmOilAction.org
[2] AngelFire.com
Headline image from PalmOilAction.org. “These companies have verified that all of the products displayed as at 3/4/07 contain palm oil or a palm oil derivative.”
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