Palm oil and the stupidest man in the world - Sepp Blatter!

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by: Palm Hugger
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Word Count: 1462
Date: Sun, 18 Jul 2010 Time: 7:31 AM
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Sepp Blatter has the singular honor of presiding over probably the worst World Cup in its entire history. According to critics, in years to come, if the 2010 FIFA World Cup isn't remembered with any particular fondness, much of the blame will be placed squarely on the obtuse shoulders of Sepp Blatter.

A football critic, JP Fear had to this say about the incident in the World Cup second round match between England and Germany when, with the scoreline perched at 2-1 in Germany's favor, English midfielder Frank Lampard's shot struck the crossbar and bounced down a clear 1 yard over the line and neither the referee nor the linesman signaled a goal and play continued, sparking worldwide outrage at the man who has over the years stubbornly and obtusely refused to countenance goal line technology that has been successfully embraced by other sports such as tennis and motor racing:

"The stupidest man in football?

FIFA President: Sepp Blatter.

How can this modern game, the one with the millions and millions of pounds of money not to mention the passion and hearts of millions and millions of fans be held back by this old dinosaur?

Yes, I of course talk following the bitterness of FIFA - led by a 74-year-old man - refusing to use goal line technology."

Fear goes on: "The referees want it, the players want it, the managers want it, the players and pundits want it, the commentators want it and most importantly every fan I've ever talked to also wants it.

So, the stupidest man in football remains... Sepp Blatter!"

The uproar led Blatter to apologize on Tuesday for refereeing mistakes that have blighted the 2010 World Cup.

"Naturally we deplore when you see the evidence of refereeing mistakes," Blatter said in reference to two blown calls on Sunday that hurt the English and Mexican teams in their efforts to advance to the quarterfinals.

With regard to the blown English call, Blatter said at Tuesday's briefing that FIFA would "reopen" the file on implementing video technology to help referees avoid mistakes regarding goal line decisions.

"It is obvious that after the experiences so far at this World Cup it would be a nonsense not to re-open the file on goal line technology. Something has to be changed," he told a select group of media.

For this same man who had for years, justified the inane decision to keep out goal line technology on the grounds that "The game must be played in the same way no matter where you are in the world," Blatter said in a statement on FIFA's website at the time. "The simplicity and universality of the game is one of the reasons for its success."

Nobody told Blatter the facts that are staring everyone in the face - that most sports have different levels of technological support at different levels of the sport. For instance, novice track meets rely on the hand held stopwatch with the photofinish employed at Olympic level. Similarly, novice chess competitions do not have the sophisticated timers used during chess Olympiads. None of the sports who have embraced technology at the highest level of the sport have suffered a decline in popularity as a result of it!

Further, far worse was Fifa's decision to introduce a synthetic abomination otherwise known as the Adidas Jabulani ball at a tournament where seven of the 10 stadiums are at high altitude.

Controlling this shocking sphere at venues like Johannesburg's Soccer City Stadium (Elevation: 1753 metres) has proved to be about as easy as tap dancing on the moon.

"The Jabulani Ball is an unmitigated disaster that has already committed many crimes against football," said Craig Johnston, the South African-born former Liverpool midfielder.

"This is the worst World Cup ever for poor football, in terms of shots off target, passes off target, free kicks not scored and goals not scored. That's not me speaking... it's the statistics speaking."

Johnston was the inventor of both the Adidas Predator boot and Traxion sole system and pioneered the use of slow motion and digital footage to study the flight characteristics of a football in the air.

He says he is personally writing to Fifa President Sepp Blatter to demand that the Jabulani be binned after watching the first two weeks of the tournament in South Africa.

"A cheap supermarket ball were the words that I used when I first kicked it," he said.

The best footballers in the world were made to look like schoolboy novices and the standard of football at this World Cup will forever be remembered as one hard pushed to match the standards of a Division 3 football game.

Again, FIFA's curious decision to stage the world's most watched sporting event of all time using a bunch of mediocre referees drawn from around the world on the basis of geography (rather than ensuring that only the best is selected) ensured that this world cup will always be remembered for refereeing boo boos and gross injustice that will forever scar the integrity and credibility of FIFA.

In many ways, the obtuse refusal of Blatter over the years to see the facts and blind adherence to untenable position reminds me of the anti-palm oil campaigns of green groups such as Greenpeace, the Friends of the Earth (FOE) and the Rainforest Action Network (RAN).

For one, in a recent analysis, the Economist wrote: "The oil palm is an efficient crop, yielding up to ten times more oil per hectare than soyabeans, rapeseed or sunflowers. On 5% of the world's vegetable-oil farmland it produces 38% of output, more than any of these other crops. Any substitute would need more land. Its bounty makes it relatively cheap."

Yet, these green groups can accuse palm oil of causing massive deforestation and releasing carbon from the deforestation.

In the view of Palmhugger.org, for the green groups to ironically adopt this intractable position on palm oil is quite similar to Blatter's stubborn refusal to do the honorable thing, which reeks of capitulation to commercial interests. Just as Blatter stands accused of complicity with the billion dollar industry of illicit bookies (and some say, could be the real reason for his previously intractable opposition to goal line technology, the introduction of which would make the game less controversial which would, in turn, impact adversely on the bookies ability to make a killing every time a highly rated team loses), these green groups like Greenpeace, FOE and RAN are similarly accused of selling out to lobbies that are afraid to fight the world's cheapest cooking oil on a level playing field!

If these green groups really care about the environment, why do they remain silent on the 33 millions tons of carbon emitted during the annual process of coal mining in the UK. After all, the cultivation of palm oil has been hailed recently by researchers from Wageningen University in the Netherlands as "the most efficient energy crop," but is yet systematically demonized as destructive of rainforest and contributing to global warming.

The university's finding is a rejection of environmental NGOs and the anti-palm oil lobbyists who consistently claim that palm oil is unsustainable.

Its research found that palm oil, sugar cane and sweet sorghum are currently the most sustainable energy crops. These commodities also produce "far smaller quantities of greenhouse gases than fossil fuels".

The university's analysis considered nine different energy crops against nine different sustainability criteria with palm oil coming out on top while biofuel from maize from the United States and wheat from Europe scored far lower.

The report's author, Sander de Vries, concluded that sustainable sugar canes and oil palms get the most energy per hectare and cause the least environmental damage.

It is well documented that the EU Commission has been funding up to 70% of the annual budgets of green groups like FOE and consequently, wittingly or unwittingly their anti-palm oil campaigns. More curiously, the concomitant increase in the intensity of FOE's anti-palm oil campaigns as the funding from the EU Commission increased cannot be mere coincidence.

This has raised the ugly specter that green groups are used to erect trade barriers against palm oil in the guise of environmental concerns and the media should have been alerted to the possibility that these green groups like Greenpeace, FOE and RAN are supping with the devil, given the obvious anomalies of their campaigns against an inherently sustainable crop - palm oil!

About the Author

Palmhugger is a palm oil advocacy site that makes no apologies for exposing the lies, untruths and equivocations on palm oil spewed by a coterie of environmental morons against the world's most sustainable edible oil and biofuel feedstock. We are part of a collective group of palm oil sympathizers that have grown tired of the blatant untruths, spin, lies and unfair trade bloc promoting activities of green NGOs like Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth (FOE) against palm oil.

In vigorously exploding the myths and falsehoods propagated about palm oil in relation to deforestation, global warming, palm based biodiesel, the environment and the sustainability of palm oil, let the environmental morons be forewarned: In the interests of truth, we'll never hesitate to call a spade a spade… in exposing your lies about palm oil, with absolutely no holds barred!"

Palmhugger is made up of professionals and individuals with a great passion for the truth. We are biologists, creative designers, engineers, business men and women, professional tennis players, stay-at-home moms, retirees, college students, film makers, journalists, communication experts… you name it!

Our goals are all the same - to advance the cause of truth through better and wider dissemination of true palm oil environmental news and views, assisting in CSR initiatives, or developing programs for advocacy and lobbying of palm oil environmental matters, always with an emphasis on truth.