Archived News

13/07/2010 (Guardian.co.uk) - From the margarine we eat to the wheels on our cars to the shampoo in our showers, palm oil is everywhere. That's why we must strive to make it sustainable, says Caroline Spelman, secretary of state for the environment.

09/07/2010 (Agrimoney) - Crops made a tentative start to the day, as the prospect of influential data later distracted Chicago investors from their adjustments to weak reports on foreign wheat, and a campaign to reinject premiums into prices.

13/07/2010 (TEMPO Interactive), Jakarta - The Forestry Production Management director-general, Hadi Daryanto, denied the news that the forest conversion moratorium to make way for palm oil plantation was extended from two years to five years. The moratorium is linked to the letter of intent (LoI) between Indonesia and Norway.

13/07/2010 (BBC News) - A research project into the use of palm oil in the UK is being launched by the government.

13/07/2010 (The Star Online) - SERIOUSLY speaking, no oil palm planter wants to be faced with a similar predicament experienced by Indonesian plantation group Sinar Mas over the past six months.

12/07/2010 (Triple Pundit) - In recent years, Britain has established itself as a forerunner in ethical consumer consciousness due to our keen awareness of green products. With “expenditure growing threefold in the last 10 years” according to Co-operative’s 2009 ethical consumerism report, our response to eco and ethical produce has been unequivocal, especially when it comes to food. As the leader of the pack, Fairtrade works towards social and economic change for farmers and their communities. Since its conception 18 years ago it has been steadily, but noticeably infiltrating our purchasing habits. Yet it wasn’t until the 2000′s that Fairtrade really took off, proudly announcing a staggering 30-fold increase in purchases over the last 10 years.

12/07/2010 (Triple Pundit) - In terms of money, both Cadbury and Nestlé are hardly without the means to sort questions over their operations; with a turnover of £6 billion (USD$9 billion) last year, Mr. Cadbury took home £808 million (USD$1.2 billion) in profit, whilst Mr. Nestle took a staggering £6.2 billion (USD$9.3 billion) home, just under 10% of their annual turnover. Although both are putting money into their self-policed Cocoa Plans over the next 10 years, in the case of Nestlé, it only represents a measly 1% of their annual turnover spread across the duration of the project, so it’s hardly breaking the bank.

12/07/2010 (ITN) - A research programme is set to examine the extent that palm oil is used by UK consumers in an attempt to stop deforestation, the Government has announced.

13/07/2010 (World Research Institute (WRI)) - A new policy to develop oil palm on degraded land could protect Indonesia’s forests. But what does “degraded” really mean?

12/07/2010 (Jakarta Post) - Writing in the International Herald Tribune late last year, Tun Dr. Lim Yeng Kaik, a former senior Malaysian Cabinet minister, characterized the campaign of Western environmental activists to restrict the palm oil industry as the environmental version of the “White Man’s Burden”. The aim was to impose western values on colonial peoples. He coined the term the Green Man’s burden.

12/07/2010 (Business Mirror) - LOCAL coconut-oil producers are pushing for a review of the computation used by transmission companies for their transmission demand charge after some mills in Mindanao registered up to a 79-percent hike in their per-kilowatt-hour (kWh) rate from January to May.

12/07/2010 (Commodity Online) - Palm oil stocks in Malaysia tumbled to 10 month lows in June as exports surprisingly outpaced a weaker-than-expected recovery in production.