EPA Rejects Palm Oil: Good News for Indonesian Rainforests

Before I started doing environmental work, I’d assumed that biofuel use would have a positive effect on the climate. It turns out the truth about biofuels is much more complex than I’d originally thought. Not every biofuel on the market today has a positive impact on the environment, and some actually pose a major threat. [...]

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Occupy Our Food Supply!

Cargill tries to employ a 'too big to fail' analysis of their role in fighting world hunger, but it is the research of multiple studies that show that organic agriculture and agroecology have a better chance of created food security and solving the problems of hunger than the corporate model profiteering from crisis to crisis.

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Exposing APP: Keeping Our Eyes On The Prize

As Rainforest Action Network (RAN) continues our negotiations with The Walt Disney Company to secure a comprehensive paper policy that would exclude rainforest destruction from the company’s products, we are also keeping our eyes on the real prize: reforming logging giant and Indonesian rainforest destroyer Asia Pulp and Paper (APP). APP has been called “one [...]

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RAN Staff Finds Deforestation And Violence For Palm Oil Unchecked By The RSPO

As the 9thAnnual Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) meeting wrapped up on the island of Borneo, the crisis stemming from the uncontrolled expansion of palm oil plantations into rainforests and communities reached a fever pitch. Consider this: In the few days that RAN’s four staff-member delegation attended the RSPO meeting in SE Asia, the [...]

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RSPO Missing Persons Report

Update 11/25/11 10:08am Despite key commitments to work with the RSPO to meet consumer demands, several key RSPO members are missing at this year’s RSPO meeting in Sabah, Malaysia. Has anyone recently seen Kellogg’s, McDonald’s or Girl Scouts USA? They were last seen buying palm oil with Cargill and making assurances to the public that [...]

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Man Up: Music Video Call-To-Action To Oppose The Keystone XL Pipeline Nov. 6th

Obama: Man Up! No to the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline! Becky White and the Secret Mission have just released this catchy and hilarious protest anthem/call to action track and music video — featuring RAN’s own Executive Director Rebecca Tarbotton on violin — called “Man Up!” The song calls on people to gather at the [...]

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Cargill’s Pinkwashing Attempt Backfires At Fancy Luncheon

Katie Burgess, executive director of the Trans Youth Support Network, was asked to address the 18th Annual Coming Out Day Luncheon last week. But when she learned that Cargill was a corporate sponsor of the event, she decided to address an issue that was far more important than keeping everyone comfortable. Instead of kissing up [...]

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Peat Fires Greet Governors’ Climate and Forests Task Force Assembly

Thick smoke from burning peatlands hangs over the capital of Central Kalimantan in Indonesian Borneo every morning. The smell from the smoke is pervasive, a constant reminder of how Indonesia has become the third largest greenhouse gas emitter in the world. Driven by relentless and ill advised palm oil expansion, Kalimantan’s carbon rich but relatively [...]

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Cargill Losing Minnesota Community Support Over Rainforest Destruction

If a place exists where Cargill has spent the time and resources to look as proper as the front row of a church on Sunday, it’s in the wealthy Minnesota suburbs where the quiet giant is headquartered. Unfortunately for everyone else, Minnesota is also the only place (besides the Internet) where Cargill bothers to try [...]

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Join the Race to Save Rainforests And Orangutans: Earn a Renegade Merit Badge!

This post is by Girl Scouts Madison Vorva (age 16) and Rhiannon Tomtishen (age 15), who have been campaigning to get palm oil out of Girl Scout Cookies for the past few years. Five years ago, while doing research for our Girl Scout Bronze Award, we learned that the cultivation of palm oil and palm [...]

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