Should we really be avoiding palm oil?

Being in about 50% of products on our supermarket shelves, it’s essential to make this ingredient sustainable. We agree, sustainably produced palm oil should just be the norm. We are working with local governments to apply the RSPO Principles & Criteria at the jurisdictional level. It’s great that the State of Sabah, Malaysia, the Seruyan District in Indonesia, and Ecuador are working towards jurisdictional certification.

Until we achieve 100% sustainable palm oil worldwide, we must provide tools for consumers to easily make the right purchasing decisions. If you are based in the UK, we recommend Giki Badges. This mobile app allows shoppers to detect sustainable palm oil in products by scanning bar codes. Let us know how you get on!

I have tried the Giki app on products round my home and several times in supermarkets. It’s easy to use and scanning barcodes works very well.

Showing whether palm oil is sustainable seems to be one of the better features of the app. It was interesting to discover that the app also covers a variety of other features but awarding of badges seems a little haphazard. To give one example, one brand of coffee beans receives three out of six Giki Badges for ‘healthier option, free from additives and plant based’ whereas another gets three out of seven for ‘healthier option, free from additives and responsibly sourced’. On a third bag, both responsibly sourced and plant based badges appear, giving a score of four out of seven. Very confusing. 😕

I was surprised how few products I buy contain palm oil.

It’s very disappointing to see how many products are awarded zero Giki Badges but tapping the ‘Learn more’ button suggests that in many cases this may be due to lack of information.

Perhaps the best way to get us buying products made using sustainable palm oil would be to have a recognisable logo. The coffee beans I buy usually have a Fairtrade or Rainforest Alliance logo. Interestingly the Giki app acknowledges only Fairtrade as being responsibly sourced.

Here’s a list compiled by WWF of ingredients that could be (and in many cases are) produced from palm oil:

Vegetable Oil, Vegetable Fat, Palm Kernel, Palm Kernel Oil, Palm Fruit Oil, Palmate, Palmitate, Palmolein, Glyceryl, Stearate, Stearic Acid, Elaeis Guineensis, Palmitic Acid, Palm Stearine, Palmitoyl Oxostearamide, Palmitoyl Tetrapeptide-3, Sodium Laureth Sulfate, Sodium Lauryl Sulfate, Sodium Kernelate, Sodium Palm Kernelate, Sodium Lauryl Lactylate/Sulphate, Hyrated Palm Glycerides, Ethyl Palmitate, Octyl Palmitate, Palmityl Alcohol

We agree it should be made easy for everyone to shop and know about ingredients.

The list shared by @wavechange is very useful. You can also download the Giki Badges app and scan barcodes to detect palm oil in products and find out whether it’s been produced sustainably.

I am not optimistic that knowing the ingredients will alter many peoples buying habits.

Thanks RSPO. I’ve downloaded the app and will try it next time I’m in a supermarket.

Your list is nearly as bad as the hidden names for milk wavechange and that is not good when you are shopping for an allergy.

Products should not be able to hide behind alternate names.

I agree that it would be helpful to standardise on a single name, especially when referring to chemicals. ‘Vegetable oil’ and ‘vegetable fat’ are no use for those who have a problem with these products. Elaeis guineensis is a species of palm tree, so that does not belong in the list. 🌴

Off topic, but action is needed to require the ingredients of unpackaged products to be identified – for example bakery goods and alcoholic drinks.

There are various articles about regulating the industry freely available, including this review: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/rego.12220

I do not see any such regulation as being unique to palm oil. It would seem relevant to many sectors, whether in the food production industry, forestry, building and other infrastructure projects, where land is “repurposed” and income is generated.

As I suggested above, this is simply one part of an overall issue. I believe the only way out of this is to change the way we use products, stop using those that deplete resources but are unnecessary, make the best use of what are necessary and avoid waste.

Commercial activities are extensively regulated for a variety of reasons, as we have discussed elsewhere. It would be useful if all palm oil production was carried out under what is currently considered to be best practice rather than relying on voluntary schemes. In certain ways the production of palm oil is efficient, as you mentioned earlier. I first learned about intensive production from a book used in A-level teaching.

It would be interesting to discuss unnecessary products elsewhere. There’s a growing demand for men’s cosmetics. 🙁

The problem seems to me to be that regulation only works in those countries that choose to accept regulation. It usually adds to costs leaving those other countries being more competitive. We see the results of that in all products.

I am not against regulation but often more fundamental cures are needed. I do not see why men’s cosmetics, no more than any other, should be regarded as necessary and require the use of a resource that could be used to better effect. But that is the way of the world and until we tackle unnecessary consumerism we will be stuck with ever-increasing use of scarce resources. Until…….

I don’t disagree, but let’s get the regulation in place and try to tackle the other problems.

Thanks for sharing your perspective, Malcolm. Land use issues are indeed common to many agricultural commodities including palm oil and soy and we must look at the way a crop is grown, not at the product itself.

It’s positive to see there are many initiatives to promote sustainable farming and sourcing – RSPO in palm oil, but also the Round Table for Responsible Soy, the Global Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, etc.

Follow our social media channels to stay tuned on what we’re doing towards making sustainable palm oil the norm.

I wonder just how much use could be made of human waste, apart from fertiliser and methane. The practice of using potable water to sluice it into the sewers seems a waste of resource. In a (much) more macabre line, we may well be faced with recycling our dead in the future, a process that the rest of the animal kingdom seems to have as a routine.

Hi there, the unsustainable production of palm oil has indeed done a lot of environmental and social damage. With growing global demand for vegetable oil, palm oil is here to stay and companies must urgently move towards sustainable methods.

With requirements such as no deforestation, no fire, no new planting on peat and respect of human rights (Decent Living Wage, no child labour, protection of human rights defenders, etc.), the RSPO Principles & Criteria set a standard for sustainable production.

Find out more about the RSPO standard in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQ9HN-dyRFg

We could ask whether cosmetics are essential?

They might be for some but most could easily live without them and look just as good. I would distinguish between cosmetics and toiletries.

We could distinguish between cosmetics and toiletries. As to their necessity, I would bear in mind that cosmetics may not necessarily have to do with vanity, but with eg concealing scars post surgery and make the realistic difference between being psychologically housebound or not. Even still nowadays, women especially are sensitive to their appearance, even if we’re all beautiful just the way we are :). Example of necessary toiletries, depending on the job you’ve got, hand moisturisers are essential to combat dermatitis as it can prevent you from doing your job, never mind be unsightly and painful.

Absolutely. Medications and similar products are essential. Do they use palm oil?

Some of them may. Please see this about SLS: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/1DjRTHSCZK3h7V6dlxyHRdP/are-my-wash-products-damaging-my-skin . It seems that Aqueous Cream BP was prescribed until recently. It begs the question, what else is there out there?

And what about sunscreen lip balm, face cream and body lotion that may not be prescribed, but are essential (even in Scotland 🙂 ). Your life saver could irritate your skin and not be environmentally friendly.

It’s a minefield.

We need something simple to navigate, not dozens of schemes and their certifications.