Palm Oil: Yes We Cancun

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by: Palm Hugger
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Date: Mon, 31 Jan 2011 Time: 5:53 PM
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2 seminal events marked the years 2009 and 2010 respectively.

During 2009, the biggest news story centered on the unwanted dissemination of e-mails among climate-change alarmists calling themselves scientists.

This past year, in 2010, it was the unwanted dissemination of U.S. State Department diplomatic cables by a member of the U.S. army and hackers trading as WikiLeaks and calling themselves journalists.

Not only were Climategate and WikiLeaks Internet-enabled, they have produced, and are likely to produce, surprising results.

The Climategate exposure helped contribute to the failure of the Copenhagen conference. Copenhagen was celebrated by presidents and prime ministers, and no doubt, by everyone aspiring to claim moral ownership of the climate change agenda.

What a difference a year makes! Second-tier politicians and diplomats attended the followup at Cancun. The "Cancun Agreement," said John Broder in the New York Times, had modest aims and achievements that fell "well short" of what the alarmists wished for. Alan Meyer of the Union of Concerned Scientists lamented that "expectations may have been set low enough to allow for success."
In common sense language, there has been, if not a long overdue return to reality, then a fatal undermining of the credibility of the rhetoric of apocalypse.

The detailed consequences of WikiLeaks are unclear, but some of the implications are coming into focus.

With the increasingly severe and record winters that have been plaguing the Northern hemisphere for the past 6 years, all climate alarmists are living on borrowed time. It is only a matter of time before the world wakes up and asks "What Global Warming?"

Over here at Palmhugger.org, we can hardly wait to celebrate this seminal event of global awakening!

For too long now, green NGOs such as Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth (FOE) have been playing the deforestation and climate change card on behalf of their shady paymasters to stop the juggernaut that is palm oil in the world edible oil market.

However, the green groups appear to be standing on shaky ground on the facts.

An article by the CEO of the Malaysian Palm Oil Council, Dr Yusof Basiron is instructive. Dr Basiron pointed out that the palm oil industry's share of world agricultural land is only 0.22 per cent. The share of loss of carbon stock (deforestation) caused by oil palm compared with total global agriculture is thus assumed to be 0.22 per cent. Says Dr Basiron: "It is, therefore, morally unacceptable for WENGOs to ask for palm oil-producing countries to reduce their share of agriculture, which accounts for merely 0.22 per cent of the world's agricultural area."

Dr Basiron observes: "Even the total greenhouse gas (GHG) emission of global agriculture of 17 per cent is considered small compared with the burning of fossil fuel, which contributes 57 per cent of GHG emission. The carbon footprint of oil palm cultivation globally is, therefore, 0.22 per cent times 17 per cent of the total or 0.0374 per cent of global GHG emissions. This has no bearing on global warming, hence making it morally wrong to blame oil palm as a significant contributor to global warming."

He argued, most succintly that "many other economic activities are responsible for the vast amount of GHG emission. These activities are accepted as part of the economic growth processes needed to sustain the world economy. Efforts to reduce GHG emissions should be directed at these economic activities as they are the main cause of GHG emission. Curtailing the expansion of oil palm on the basis of its impact on global warming is, therefore, scientifically unjustified as the contribution is only 0.0374 per cent of global GHG emission."

Dr Basiron also pointed out that "If the loss of biodiversity is used as an argument to discourage oil palm cultivation, then ample forest is being conserved. The United Nations convention only requires 10 per cent of the country's land area to be kept as forest for conserving biodiversity, and Malaysia has far exceeded this by committing 50 per cent."

Moreover, Dr Basiron notes: "The Indonesians have signed an agreement with Norway for a moratorium on deforestation while the Malaysian government has repeatedly announced its assurance of maintaining at least 50 per cent of its land area as permanent forest. Deforestation thus appears to be a non-issue."

In the view of Palmhugger.org, until the devious paymasters end their unholy alliance with these green groups, it will only be a matter of time before their collective credibility are destroyed as the world awakens to the absurdity of their vision and message of apocalypse in the face of rapidly cooling winters in the Northern hemisphere.

If there should be an apocalypse, it is more likely to be the apocalypse of the climate alarmists, reeling in the midst of a fast cooling earth, Cancun or no Cancun! Far better for them to come to the round-table and work out a solution acceptable to all stakeholders in the palm oil industry. THE END.

About the Author

Palm Hugger 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.