Nature Alert: Response from Tesco

Friday 19 February 2010

Response from Tesco

Dear Sean,

Thank you for taking the time to alert us of the forthcoming TV programme due to be broadcast on 22nd February 2010.

As full members of the Round Table on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) we are committed to using sustainable palm in our product range.

This year we have supported further improvements around the environmental standards in the RSPO to reduce the chances of deforestation and controls on CO2 emissions. We have also joined a coalition of over 50 UK-based companies calling on the industry to stop all deforestation of rainforest and peat forests for palm oil expansion.

We do not use palm oil in any of our products. Instead we use derivatives and, at present, the traceability and certification of the derivatives of palm oil are still in their infancy. The flow of certified palm oil to derivatives is going to take time.

We are working with our suppliers to ensure that we have a traceable and audited system in place so that we can get certified derivatives in our products. All our palm derivatives are already traceable to RSPO members and we have made a public commitment to use 100% sustainable palm oil in our products by 2015.

I hope you find this information helpful.

Kind Regards

Joan Duncan

Customer Service Manager

Tesco Customer Service

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.