Palm Oil, Greenpeace, FOE, the Hammer and the Nail

View PDF | Print View
by: palmoiltruthfoundation
Total views: 7
Word Count: 583
Date: Fri, 29 Oct 2010 Time: 5:47 AM
0 comments

A young teen, was constantly getting into trouble with the law but he always apologized when his parents confronted him. No matter how much he hurt his parents with his previous wrongdoing, he would invariably turn around and do something else wrong - knowing he would be forgiven.

Finally, his dad took him out to the garage for a talk. Dad took out a hammer and pounded a nail into the garage wall. Then he gave his son the hammer and told the son to pull out the nail.

The boy shrugged, grabbed the hammer and yanked out the nail. "Now, take the hammer and pull out the nail hole," his dad quietly requested.

"That's impossible!" the boy said. "I can't pull it out!"

As this story illustrates, actions carries consequences. What the policy makers in Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth (FOE) should be aware of is that their concerted actions against palm oil has dire consequences for the millions of poor workers employed in the palm oil industry and the smallholders who depend on palm oil for their livelihood.

Gatot Irianto, research director at Indonesia's Ministry of Agriculture, pleaded with producers, scientists and NGOs meeting on the holiday island of Bali recently to reconsider the plant's reputation.

"Stop demonising palm oil," he urged. Irianto says palm oil should be considered a "gift from nature" that provides a significant economic boon for the country, where it is "helping to eradicate poverty" and providing employment for 3 million people.

Certainly, most experts agree that demand for palm products such as cooking oil, margarine, soaps, cosmetics and resins, will continue to increase and better management is the only way to reduce its environmental impact.

However, some sensible voices are beginning to rise above the cacophony of hype on the debate: "Rapid growth in global demand, notably from China and India, is likely to drive land use change. We cannot change that," said Moray McLeish of the World Resources Institute.

"The solution is an increased utilisation of degraded land," which usually results from deforestation or overgrazing, he said.

Jean-Charles Jacquemard, an engineer at CIRAD, the French Centre for Agricultural Research said palm oil was too profitable for producers in Asia and Africa to abandon, regardless of pressure from the West.

"It is a plant which has many benefits for them. It produces a large amount of oil per hectare, three to six times more than rapeseed or sunflower," he said. "Its cultivation uses relatively little fertilizer -- around eight kilogrammes (18 pounds) per tree per year."

In Indonesia, 40 percent of production comes from small producers who, by farming between 10 and 20 hectares, "are able to live decently and send their children to university", he said.

In Malaysia too, smallholders account for close to 40% of palm oil production due to the introduction of FELDA schemes which were basically rural poverty and land ownership schemes launched in the 60s which were so successful that it helped propel Malaysia into a fast developing nation and served as a benchmark for poverty eradication throughout the world.

In the view of the Palm Oil Truth Foundation, green groups like Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth should come to terms with the immense social implications of their actions and plot a path of engagement with the industry rather than one of destruction and confrontation. THE END.

About the Author

Palm Oil Truth Foundation is an international non-governmental and not-for-profit organisation, without strings to the world of commerce and power. We are a people organisation, organised for the people and founded upon the principles of integrity and responsibility as a global citizen with the sole purpose of representing TRUTH to the global community about health, environmental and economic benefits of palm oil.