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Burger King drops palm oil supplier linked to Borneo rainforest destruction mongabay.com September 02, 2010
In a report issued last month, Sinar Mas tried to misrepresent the results of the audit by claiming it cleared its subsidiary PT Smart of environmental transgressions. After the claims appeared in news media, the auditor, BSI Group, rebuked Sinar Mas by releasing a statement emphasizing that PT Smart had cleared forests and peatlands without proper permits in eight out of the 11 concessions audited on Sumatra and Kalimantan, the Indonesian part of Borneo. The activity violated Indonesian law and rules under the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil's certification system. Burger King announced its decision in the following statement:
As a result, we have decided we will no longer purchase palm oil from Sinar Mas or its subsidiaries. We are in the process of transitioning to a new palm oil supplier for the 176 BURGER KING® restaurants that were supplied by Sinar Mas. In addition, we are notifying our suppliers of our intent to discontinue the use of palm oil supplied by Sinar Mas in the manufacturing of our products.
Palm oil is used widely in processed foods and cooking oil, but its production has, at times, come at the expense of tropical forests in Indonesia and Malaysia, putting endangered species such as orangutan at risk and increasing greenhouse gas emissions. Greenpeace and other activist groups are trying to persuade the oil palm growers to adopt stronger sustainability standards that would prohibit conversion of forest lands for new plantations. The palm oil industry maintains its crop is a cheap source of vegetable oil and an important generator of wealth. Producers note that growing less productive sources of vegetable like canola, corn, and soy, would require more land than oil palm.
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(08/30/2010) Rapid expansion of oil palm plantations across Southeast Asia have run roughshod over customary tenure systems, resulting in exploitation of local communities, conflict, and outright human rights abuses, reports a new assessment of the palm oil sector by the Forest Peoples Programme (FPP), an international indigenous rights group.
(08/19/2010) Sinar Mas, an Indonesian conglomerate whose holdings include Asia Pulp and Paper, a paper products brand, and PT Smart, a palm oil producer, was sharply rebuked Wednesday over a recent report where it claimed not to have engaged in destruction of forests and peatlands. At least one of its companies, Golden Agri Resources, may now face an investigation for deliberately misleading shareholders in its corporate filings.
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