another indictment against palm oil

[mishmish]

They have each other.

Well of course, but it's still happening, right? Women all over our country are being raped by family members, "friends", strangers, employers, "mentors", prison guards...and too often, their word isn't believed. Mothers don't believe daughters, schools don't believe students, etc. I'm a rape survivor and have lived with that reality. The "Me Too" movement made some of my family open their eyes.

I use palm oil in most of my soap. When I started making soap 30 years ago, I used tallow and lard. I still make tallow soap for a wholesale customer, but most of my retail customers want vegetarian or vegan products. So although I'd like to go back to using animal fats, I haven't yet.

 

[gardengeek]

Please excuse my ignorance, but I never heard about the "bad" palm oil industry until I found this forum and not once has any of my friends, family or coworkers mentioned it when we talk about my soap. I don't sell so I don't know if there are many informed consumers in and around my location that it would matter to either. I purchase my palm oil from soap suppliers that certify it as RSPO so that is good enough for me. I have a few recipes with PO and I like what it brings to the party.

I agree with others that there are bad, greedy and evil people in all industries. I also don't read much on the internet as articles are rarely based in fact. For all I know, the negative Palm Oil campaign is being financed by the Coconut Oil industry...lol

 

[Misschief]

I am from India and the best quality of our produce is exported to developed countries at piddly prices and the farmers hardly get anything. The prices of much much inferior quality of the same produce in Indian stores is much higher than the price at which they are available in the developed country stores!

This happens everywhere. I'm from Canada; the best of our lumber, our grain, our fruit, our meat and dairy products is shipped all over the world while we import from other countries and pay a premium for the items that we are able to grow on our own doorstep. I think part of the issue is that we, in the West especially, want to be able to have everything we want whenever we want it. I always use the example of strawberries; they're a seasonal fruit. We grow them here in BC and they're amazing! It drives me crazy to see strawberries imported from the southern hemisphere in the grocery stores at Christmas time (and most of the year round as far as that goes). They don't taste like strawberries because they're not ripe when they're picked but people want them at Christmas and don't want to wait to eat them seasonally.

Sorry.... little rant over.

 

[Dawni]

Cows are butchered for their meat, not their fat. If no one used it, the fat would most certainly be sent to the landfill, as it is of little monetary value compared to the meat. I view that as being extremely wasteful.

This is my stand on lard as well...

The simple fact is that Human greed is the reason for exploitation.

Ditto! Some days I even question selling my soap because it is a want (as far as I'm concerned on those days lol) and not a need.

So palm.. Very soon we here in the Philippines are going to have the same problem with coconut oil, and we're already following the footsteps of Indonesia and Malaysia with our palm. What's funny is that it's soooo difficult to even find actual palm oil, there's only a ton of palm olein.

We already have an unsolved problem with the export of our people........ Not the same thing I know, but I have to say it lol

Short term solution? Know where the product is coming from. I actively searched for a long time for a supplier of palm and coconut oils, and when I found the one I'm using now I sent em a ton of questions. They told me, that no forests or fields were razed to plant the trees solely for commercial use. Their trees have been planted several generations back on their owned flat land. They also told me that they are content being small time producers, and that their employees are poor villagers who otherwise have no other avenues of earning. Lastly, the workers are well compensated.

Works for me. And I will continue to use palm and coconut oils from them. Like everything else, there is no black n white, and it's up to you to do your research.