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Archives for February 2010

Your response: Dying for a Biscuit

Thanks for coming to the programme to watch Dying for a Biscuit.

Our examination of palm oil industry triggered a number of interesting online comments about deforestation, the future use of palm oil as an energy source, shopping habits, why palm oil is not listed on the ingredients of many household products and of course, the situation of the orangutans in Borneo.

Some of our viewers asked what happened to Melay, the orangutan chained to a pole that was featured in the programme.

During filming, we discovered Melay - an orphan taken as a pet by local people 10 years ago - as we returned from a trip to a palm oil concession.

As soon as I returned to the mainland and was able to e-mail, I sent a message to the charity giving the whereabouts of the chained orangutan.

Subsequently I also passed the information to another orangutan charity that works in West Kalimantan.

As I write, Melay has not yet been rescued but her owner told me that she is often moved around the river community, which could mean that finding her will prove difficult for rescue charities.

In response to questions about what the Indonesian government are doing to halt illegal deforestation, I put some of what we discovered to the country's Minister of Agriculture, Dr Suswono.

He assured me that if there is evidence of illegal development of palm oil plantations and clearing of high conservation forest he would take action. Panorama will provide the Indonesian authorities with all the evidence we discovered in order to aid their efforts.

Even the European communications department thought it important to use this blog to draw viewers to what the RSPO is doing to increase the supply of sustainable oil.

With the general election coming up, some of the Panorama audience have also suggested that candidates seeking election should be asked for their views on palm oil use and labelling in the food that ends up on supermarket shelves here in Britain. Current rules allow for palm oil to be listed as vegetable oil on an ingredients list.

Those and many of the other that were sent to Panorama definitely provide plenty of food for thought on the subject.

Again, many thanks for taking the time to participate in our online discussion about Dying for a Biscuit.


The making of Dying for a Biscuit


Following a conversation at work late last year, I went home, opened my fridge, took out a tub of Flora margarine and read the ingredients on the label.

I already knew from what I'd been told that it contained palm oil but it is not listed among the ingredients.

Six weeks later, I am on a flight to the world's second largest producer of palm oil. This is also home to the critically endangered .

I must admit that before I started looking at the issues of where palm oil comes from and the role it plays in the making of some of our most popular everyday products, terms such as deforestation, conservationist, biodiversity and environmentalist didn't speak to me - the average person - about what those words actually mean.

My journalistic journey to see rainforest that is supposed to be protected chopped down and the ground beneath burnt to make way for palm oil plantations would prove memorable.

People say, at times quite rightly, "Wow I'd love to do your job, jetting around the world seeing wonderful things and places".

And it is true that the experiences we have on the road are unpredictable and often exciting. They can also be dangerous, unwelcome and exhausting.

The palm oil industry in Indonesia does not like the way Westerners investigate their business practices - both journalists and NGOs (non-government organisations) have been deported in the past.

For this trip, producer Steve Grandison and I knew that we would have to tread carefully.

Our journey included the 14 hour flight to Singapore, a six hour layover before the two hour flight to Jakarta and then the onward two hour flight to Pontianak on the Indonesian portion of the island of Borneo.

Once finally in place, I was soon to have my first meeting with the central character in Panorama's story - Dying for a Biscuit.

At an Indonesian government facility, I met Chingo, a young orang-utan that I embraced and tickled like a small child as I listened to him react and giggle.

I was truly surprised by how human-like this ape really is, reacting at times to my touch as my two-year-old little girl back home would.

We followed Chingo and another orang-utan called JoJo to the airport where he was transported in a cage, in the cargo hold for an hour's flight to Ketapang.

At the in Ketapang I met a dozen more, orphaned baby orang-utans in cages. There's very little room for them to manoeuvre and stretch their limbs.

The veterinarians and here in Ketapang tell us that witnessing the killing of their parents - slaughtered in the deforestations process that makes way for the palm oil plantations - has left these young apes traumatised.

I do believe that I can see the pain, the sorrow, in their eyes.

I admire the care the volunteers give the orang-utans. They tell me they are teaching them basic survival skills in the hope that one day they might be able to return them to the wild.

But their natural habitat, the rainforest, is being lost at a rate of two football pitches every minute. I now can see first hand the impact palm oil production is having on Indonesian Borneo's orang-utans.

Manufacturers, including who make that Flora in my fridge, tell us that they use a blend of vegetable oils, including palm oil, which can vary depending on supply chain issues.

They say they comply with all UK labelling rules as set out by the . Many told us they are attempting to source sustainable palm oil.

Unilever said it is committed to using sustainable palm oil in all its products by 2015, an ambitious goal given that today only 15% of its palm oil is from a sustainable source.

In the making of Dying for a Biscuit we have asked key figures in the industry if the steep price being paid by the orang-utans of Borneo in the pursuit of cheap palm oil is part of the reason it's not clearly listed as an ingredient in so many of our household products?

We will welcome your thoughts on our programme after it is broadcast on 22 February on ´óÏó´«Ã½ One. Please keep in touch.

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