The palm oil industry’s rapid growth in Southeast Asia brought with it massive amounts of deforestation and associated impacts on local communities and biodiversity. So, as oil palm operations proliferate…
Companies operating in Africa would do well to avoid conflicts over land with local populations, according to new research by the Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI), a Washington, D.C.-based NGO…
In the summer of 2016, two of the world's largest producers of palm oil, which is found in everything from lipstick to margarine, lost the ability to market what they sold…
Most of the attention around palm oil production has focused on where the crop has the largest footprint: Southeast Asia. Yet oil palm plantations are rapidly mushrooming throughout the tropics, from…
Global Witness, a London-based NGO, published a report yesterday examining the involvement of government officials and foreign aid in violent conflicts over mining, hydroelectric, tourism, and palm oil projects in Honduras.…
Twenty nonprofits and investor groups released on Tuesday a set of reporting guidelines for palm oil firms who have pledged to operate responsibly and transparently. Adherence to the guidelines would…
Nutella lovers can continue to indulge in the chocolate-hazelnut spread without fear of health risks from the palm oil it contains, according to the product’s manufacturer, Ferrero. In October, the…
Five years ago, there were likely very few people outside of Indonesia who'd ever heard of a place called the Leuser ecosystem. Today, this enormous and besieged tropical rainforest on…
Major oil palm growers in Indonesia have increasingly found that what’s bad for the environment is bad for business. The financial risk of losing buyers committed to sustainable supply chains…
Agribusiness giant Olam International has for the first time published a list of the firms it buys palm oil from, part of the company’s response to allegations that it is…
Two of Australia’s biggest retailers have been misleading customers with claims that palm oil used in their own-brand products has been certified by the world’s largest association for ethical production…
Over the past five years, the landscape of Maximiliano Moreno's property in northern Ecuador and the air he breathes has changed. He went from being surrounded by vast forest to…
Even as a new administration hostile to efforts to combat global warming is poised to take over the White House, climate activists in the U.S. are continuing to push for…
The directors of palm oil producer Plantaciones de Pucallpa SAC decided to withdraw their company from the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) on October 12, sending an official email…
Seven oil palm-growing African nations pledged today to protect their tropical forests by shifting to sustainable palm oil production. The TFA 2020 Marrakesh Declaration for the Sustainable Development of the…
As palm oil has become one of the most in-demand global commodities over the past several years, oil palm plantations have proliferated quickly throughout the tropics. Oil palm is currently…
Most of the attention paid to oil palm in Southeast Asia centers on big plantations set up by big companies, and it’s almost uniformly bad for the environment. But less…
The cachet of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil has taken a hit with the withdrawal of support for the organization by an Australian watchdog that had pushed some of…
Amid allegations of widespread abuses on its plantations, including the use of child labor, three NGOs this week lodged a formal complaint against Indonesian palm oil giant Indofood, calling for…
One of the world’s largest aerospace companies is enlisting its satellites in the fight to save forests. That’s the aim of Starling, a new service developed by Airbus Defence and…
2015 was supposed to be a big year for the palm oil industry — the year it proposed to reach a “tipping point” and begin predominantly producing and trading palm…
It was a sunny afternoon in North Sumatra when Muhamad Syahrial, a worker on a rubber estate in the Indonesian province, spotted a slithering snake among the children at play in…
Concerned by “misleading newspaper headlines and statements” published during the 15th International Peat Congress (IPC) recently held in Malaysia, 139 scientists have signed an open letter clarifying their position on…
A new $88 million line of credit promises to help small shareholders in San Martin, Peru to increase production of the region’s seven largest resources. Last week, the Global Canopy…
In July, news leaked out that Liberia’s Forestry Development Authority (FDA) was considering a new regulation to allow timber logged from palm oil and other plantations to be sold abroad.…
Junk food consumption is on the rise around the world, even though processed foods that are low in essential nutrients and high in salt, refined carbohydrates, and fat aren’t necessarily…
iberians are anxiously awaiting the passage of the stalled Land Rights Act, which many land experts in Liberia say will help drastically curtail conflicts. Liberia has long been plagued by disputes…
Borneo, home to animals like orangutans, rhinos, elephants, and proboscis monkeys is also host to some of the fastest plantation expansion in the world. Now, a new study published yesterday…
Most oil palm is grown in areas that were once species-rich and carbon-rich tropical forests, thanks to the fact that the crop’s natural range is limited to the humid tropics.…
This is the second in a series of commentaries about the disbandment of the Indonesia Palm Oil Pledge (IPOP). Read the first one here. Regardless of how conservationists and businesses…