Omair Ahmad: What would the proposed large-scale cultivation of oil palm mean to India’s ecology and economy?

By Dilip -

The truth is that Indians have switched to palm oil not because of some great choice but merely because it has come cheap. For most people cooking their food in palm oil or some mixture thereof, the content makes little difference. It is just another vegetable oil to them. The very versatility of the oil is what allows us to use it as a substitute for other kinds of oil. But the low price point of palm oil is inherently linked to the conditions of Southeast Asia. It is the massive clearing of old growth forest, abusive labour conditions that often mimic those of colonial days, and high precipitation levels that allow the price to be so low. 

Indian conditions are different, and thus the state is subsidising both the production and buying of the oil to create the illusion that it is cheap. In doing so, we are destroying the industry and livelihoods of those in other industries, such as groundnut oil, and destroying existing domestic industries that have taken much time and effort to build….

https://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/energy-and-environment/what-would-the-proposed-large-scale-cultivation-of-oil-palm-mean-to-indias-ecology-and-economy/article36510961.ece


Oceana


Kiss the Ground Film Trailer (2020) / What's the big deal about soil? / Living Soil Film


George Monbiot: Extinction’s Collaborators


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JOHN BUELL: Living on a Newly Unrecognizable Planet

 

Could the Free World start cleaning up its act - from the bottom up?


Wiped out: America's love of luxury toilet paper is destroying Canadian forests


NORMAN MILLER: The forgotten foods that could excite our tastebuds


Dan Collyns - Peru’s potato museum could stave off world food crisis


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