Like the virus, these green and civil society groups require a host. Unfortunately, palm oil just happens to be a convenient host for these “viruses” as they try to suck the life out of the commodity in a vain attempt to satiate their insatiable appetite for funds.  I say “convenient” as palm oil is a third world produced commodity and therefore not likely to have the media resources to expurgate these “viruses”! The international media, to their eternal shame have largely been complicit in doing the dirty work of these “green” and “civil society” groups through their acquiescence and failure to do their due diligence and investigate the wild claims of these groups in depth, choosing to give column inches to their “Reports” and “Press Releases” virtually verbatim!

Like viruses too, these “green” and “civil society” groups operate surreptitiously, happy to take the payola and blood money on offer to do the hatchet job on palm oil.

Fortunately for palm oil, it has science on its side.

Despite the efforts of Philip Sokolof’s American Heart Savers Association and the now discredited Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) to paint palm oil as saturated fat and therefore deleterious to heart health, lots of scientific studies have shown that palm oil is, in fact heart friendly as the saturated fatty acids in the sn-1 and -3 position (typically found in palm oil) has very different biological consequences than animal fats such as lard and milk fats as the saturated fats are primarily found in the sn-2 position! (Vide: Donald J. McNamara, PhD: “Palm Oil and Heart Health: A case of Manipulated Perception and Misuse of Science” 240S Vol 29 No. 3(s) Journal of the American College of Nutrition)

Palm oil is also the richest source of the heart friendly anti-oxidant tocotrienol, a superior form of Vitamin E as well as other heart friendly phyto-nutrients such as Co Enzyme Q10, betacarotenes and other polyphenols.

“Green” and “civil society” groups regularly trundle out wild and unsubstantiated claims against palm oil, the most offensive of which is that the crop is unsustainable in that it is responsible for massive deforestation to the extent that biodiversity is threatened and exotic animals like the orangutan is nearing extinction.
Last weekend, the Auckland Zoo organized an Orangutan Caring Week in which it promised visitors that "Sample bags of palm oil-free goodies will be available to the first 500 visitors for a gold coin donation...."

Why doesn't the Auckland Zoo own up that this event is just a fund raising exercise to fill their coffers? After all, if they truly care for the orangutans, they'd release them into the tropical jungles from whence they came rather than to subject these tropical animals to the harsh NZ winters!  

If the hype that "54 rugby fields an hour" are being cleared in Indonesia, please explain how Malaysia which had been the world's largest producer of palm oil for over a century could still manage to retain forest cover of 59.50% (see CIA's World Factbook 2011) almost double New Zealand's forest cover of 31.87% and dwarfing Autralia's dismal forest cover of 19%? Remember that Malaysia is a small country with a land mass just 20% larger than New Zealand.

The truth is that palm oil is grown on only 0.23% of the world's agricultural lands and yet produce a staggering 30% of global supply of edible oil. This is due to palm oil's inherent hyper yield nature which at 4-5 metric tons per hectare overwhelms its closest competitors like rapeseed, soy and sunflower by up to a whopping 10 times?

Deforestation Watch aka Melbourne Zoo Watch is compelled to ask: “Would palm oil still attract this much flak if the crop was not quite that overwhelmingly hyper yielding and consequently price competitive?”  It is certainly food for thought! THE END