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Naming and shaming palm-oil buyers to stop rainforest burning

HONG KONG — Singaporeans who choke on haze floating over from Indonesia can blame the world’s desire for palm oil. The edible oil is an important ingredient in the cookies, noodles and other packaged foods as well as soaps, shampoos, lipsticks and many other consumer goods. Farmers in Indonesia, the world’s biggest supplier of the commodity, often illegally burn the world’s oldest rainforest or use fire to clear old oil palms on existing plantations, and the smoke from the flames drifts across Singapore and Malaysia.

A banner reading "100% Rainforest Destruction" on a building during a Greenpeace demonstration in Jakarta in 2014. Photo: AFP

A banner reading "100% Rainforest Destruction" on a building during a Greenpeace demonstration in Jakarta in 2014. Photo: AFP

HONG KONG — Singaporeans who choke on haze floating over from Indonesia can blame the world’s desire for palm oil. The edible oil is an important ingredient in the cookies, noodles and other packaged foods as well as soaps, shampoos, lipsticks and many other consumer goods. Farmers in Indonesia, the world’s biggest supplier of the commodity, often illegally burn the world’s oldest rainforest or use fire to clear old oil palms on existing plantations, and the smoke from the flames drifts across Singapore and Malaysia.

Groups like Greenpeace and the Union of Concerned Scientists have taken to naming and shaming companies that they say aren’t doing enough to make suppliers stop the destruction of rainforests and peatlands. On Sept 21, WWF released its 2016 Palm Oil Buyers Scorecard, looking at the policies of 137 companies worldwide. The good news, according to WWF, “at least half of the companies we looked at” have made “gratifying progress” towards using sustainable palm oil that meets criteria such as a ban on the destruction of primary forests.

Public pressure seems to be helping, with many companies announcing new policies or expanding on existing policies to clean up their supply chains of palm oil. To ensure their palm oil comes from sustainable sources, companies are making commitments to trace their supply back to the farm where growers harvest the fruit or the mill where producers extract the oil. “The industry is at a critical stage on the journey to sustainable palm oil,” WWF Palm Oil lead Mr Adam Harrison said in a statement. “More major brands are now using only certified palm oil yet laggard companies continue to drag their feet.”

JOHNSON & JOHNSON

Greenpeace gave J&J a “Failing” grade in its 2016 scorecard published in March, saying the New Brunswick, NJ-based company should disclose a complete list of suppliers and sub-suppliers” but J&J was close to the top in WWF’s scorecard, winning a score of 8 out of a possible 9 — meaning the company is “well on the path” according to WWF. Among the sourcing criteria J&J adopted in 2014 is a ban on palm-oil suppliers that develop peatlands or burn land.

The company “has moved business away from two suppliers for noncompliance with our standards”, Vice President for Media Relations Ernie W Knewitz said in an e-mailed statement, “and we are continuing to take appropriate measures to verify conformance and to engage with other companies and NGOs to promote responsible palm oil production.”

PEPSICO

Two environmental groups give good grades to PepsiCo: The maker of soft drinks and snack foods received a top score of 9 on WWF’s scorecard (which places the company among those “leading the way”, according to WWF) and 80.7 out of a 100 from the UCS. But Greenpeace was more critical, saying the company “has no evidence that its palm oil is deforestation-free”.

In September, PepsiCo announced it had traced approximately 72 per cent of its palm oil to the mill, up from 65 per cent in 2015. “We are encouraged by the progress we’ve made,” the company said, “but recognise that further work is needed.” In an e-mailed statement, PepsiCo said the Greenpeace scorecard “did not capture all of our ongoing work on sustainable palm oi”. PepsiCo has set a 2020 deadline to be able to trace palm oil back to the plantations where the trees grow and has joined the Palm Oil Working Group of the Consumer Goods Forum, an industry body of retailers and manufacturers.

DOMINO’S

Like Dairy Queen, Domino’s also wasn’t on WWF and Greenpeace’s lists but got a zero score from the UCS. That grade is out of date, according to the company. Domino’s is “committed to sourcing palm oil that is produced without deforestation of High Conservation Value areas, High Carbon Stock forests or the destruction of peat land”, the company said in an e-mailed statement, saying Domino’s achieved 100 per cent palm-oil traceability back to the mill in September 2015.

WENDY’S

The fast-food chain, criticised two years in a row by the UCS for having “zero commitment” to sustainable palm oil, scored a mediocre 5 out of 9 (“started the journey”) on the WWF scorecard. Wendy’s uses palm oil in its North American restaurants for “a few non-core menu items” such as its breaded fish and breakfast biscuits, according to a statement on the company’s website. Wendy’s “is working to have a plan in place” to source sustainable palm oil for its North American restaurants by 2022, the company said in an e-mailed statement. “We’re committed to sourcing palm oil from responsible and sustainable sources.”

YUM! BRANDS

The UCS put the company among its worst offenders and the parent of KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell got no grade from WWF, which said Yum was one of a small group of companies that didn’t respond to its request for information. “We recognise that not responding to the WWF Palm Oil Scorecard Survey results in a default score of zero,” Yum vice president for public affairs Laurie Schalow said in an e-mailed statement. “However, this score does not represent our commitments and progress.” Yum plans to stop using palm oil as cooking oil and source sustainable palm oil by the end of next year. BLOOMBERG

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