Nature Alert: Eating orangutans

Sunday 28 June 2009

Eating orangutans

Letter sent to the Irish Times, but not yet published.

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Eating orangutans

It is heartening to see the excellent coverage the Irish Times has recently given to deforestation in Indonesia. (see Indonesia's failure to protect rain forests criticised. 16th July). Why? A lot of the food and household products we all have in our homes contains palm oil - singularly the biggest cause of deforestation in Indonesia. If you look at the ingredients of anything in your fridge or cupboard, if it has 'vegetable oil' listed, the chances are this is palm oil; some branded products specifically mention palm oil or palm kernel - it's the same thing.

Palm oil companies continue to destroys thousands of hectares of ancient rainforest every year. In doing so they kill millions of animals - everything; insects, fish, birds, even tigers, elephants, and orangutans - mercilessly wiped out. It does not have to be this way and the people of Ireland can join the rest of the world in helping prevent a lot of this needless destruction.

There is no need for palm oil companies to log rainforests. There is already more than enough cleared land for them to grow palm oil on.

Greenpeace are absolutely right to request an investigation into the Indonesian Ministry of Forestry; the Minister has already proven himself to be a sympathiser to illegal loggers.

You can make a difference. Please contact your local supermarket and ask them what steps have they taken to ensure palm oil in any products sold in their stores come from a fully sustainable and approved source? Let them know, you do not want to be eating food which may be tainted with the blood of orangutans.

Thank you.

Sean Whyte

Chief Executive

Nature Alert

Hall of Shame for President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and the Palm Oil Industry.

Nothing can prepare one for the sight of the systematic extermination of orangutans by the government of Indonesia.

Look at the photos and news articles on these pages in the context of a statement the President made to the media on 10th December 2007.

“In the last 35 years about 50,000 orangutans are estimated to have been lost as their habitats shrank. If this continues, this majestic creature will likely face extinction by 2050,” President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said at the launch of an orangutan conservation plan at the climate talks in Bali.

“The fate of the orangutan is a subject that goes to the heart of sustainable forests … To save the orangutan we have to save the forest.”

Statements like these are most welcome, but unless backed up by action, such words fall on deaf ears within the Ministry of Forestry....who are busy granting licences to cut down the very forests the President says they should protect!

When you think you are to busy to help, please could you reflect for a moment on .........

The following extract refers to environmental problems in general. I just hope you find it as thought provoking and relevant to orangutans as I have.

"This is such a shocking and unpalatable fact that most people deny it, or they just don't want to think about it. They believe as individuals, they can do little about it, so push it to the back of their minds. But I can't do that.

When something has to be done, we need to do it. It doesn't matter how big the challenge is or how hard the solution; if I know something is wrong, and I am in a position to help, I will do my best to make it right." Duncan Bannatyne, successful British businessman.