Malaysia’s “Sustainable” Palm Oil Just Pure Greenwash

Malaysia Sustainable Palm Oil. Photo: astromediashop As I reported on Monday, the Malaysian government—hand in hand with the country’s largest palm oil companies—is attempting to undermine the RSPO’s “sustainable palm oil” certification standard by creating its own certification. Problem is—the Malaysian palm oil industry’s version of “sustainable palm oil” is pure greenwash which is extremely [...]

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Get A Free Ride With Malaysia’s New Sustainable Palm Oil Certification Scheme

If a massive palm oil company decides that getting its plantations certified by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) is, well, just too hard, what do you think happens? The Malaysian government comes to the rescue, of course, and comes up with a solution that will allow IOI — the largest palm oil plantation [...]

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What is Sustainable Palm Oil? Part Three

This is the third and final installment in a series of posts that endeavors to answer a simple question: What is sustainable palm oil? The answer, of course, is anything but simple. The first blog post in this series explored the weaknesses of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), the dominant certification standard for [...]

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What Do Cargill’s Recent Palm Oil Commitments Mean For Its Customers?

“Whether we like it or not it is very largely our industry which is providing the economic incentives for individuals and companies to chop down trees… Between us, we spend billions of dollars buying these commodities. We can make a difference if we buy them differently and better.” – A senior Unilever executive in a [...]

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Cargill: Too Little Too Late

Today, Cargill updated its palm oil commitments. While it’s significant that Cargill has committed to a global baseline of RSPO certification, the RSPO in its current form does not guarantee that certified palm oil entering U.S. consumer brands is free of ties to deforestation, climate change, species extinction, human or Indigenous rights violations, and/or slave [...]

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What is Sustainable Palm Oil? Part Two

The first blog post in this series explored the environmental, social, transparency and enforcement weaknesses of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), the dominant certification standard for palm oil companies. This post examines the colorful spectrum of positions on “sustainable” palm oil, from environmental advocacy and conservation groups to scientists and industry groups. Organizations [...]

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What is Sustainable Palm Oil? Part One

What is Sustainable Palm Oil? Part one of a three-part series. Palm oil has become an increasingly hot topic over the last year. This thick, long-lasting oil is found in almost half of all consumer goods sold in grocery stores and it is also a main driver of rainforest destruction in Indonesia and Malaysia. As [...]

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IOI Group: Stop Undermining Indigenous Rights

Last Monday, IOI Group received an unexpected visit from a group of activists who delivered a large photo of the community of Long Teran Kanan, a community whose traditional lands have been converted to plantations by IOI Group. Along with this powerful photo, the group also delivered the following statement from Rainforest Action Network to [...]

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Applauding Won’t Cut It, Girl Scouts USA

It’s been two weeks since you joined us in supporting the work of two Girl Scouts, Madison Vorva and Rhiannon Tomtishen, in asking Girl Scouts USA (GSUSA) to get rainforest-destroying palm oil out of Girl Scout cookies. Despite receiving over 10,000 petitions from concerned Girl Scout families and cookie lovers from across the country, GSUSA CEO [...]

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The Great RSPO Membership Myth: Why Buying from RSPO Members Is Meaningless

“Companies buying palm oil need to be aware that the only way to ensure sustainable sourcing is to buy certified sustainable palm oil from companies that have been assessed against the RSPO standards. Buying from RSPO members is not enough.” – WWF, August 2010 Girl Scouts USA (GSUSA) has actively resisted getting rainforest-destroying palm oil [...]

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