{"id":193,"date":"2021-02-02T18:12:29","date_gmt":"2021-02-02T18:12:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/?p=193"},"modified":"2021-02-02T18:12:29","modified_gmt":"2021-02-02T18:12:29","slug":"palm-oil-is-destroying-the-rainforests","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/2021\/02\/02\/palm-oil-is-destroying-the-rainforests\/","title":{"rendered":"Palm Oil is Destroying the Rainforests"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>by George Walton &#8211;\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<p>In this post, we\u2019re going to explore one of the most destructive and large-scale global environmental issues \u2013 palm oil.\u00a0 The removal of native trees makes way for oil palm plantations \u2013 in return, having a devastating effect on the local biodiversity.<\/p>\n<p>We will take a look at one of the most significant drivers of deforestation across the world and decide whether choices we can make on a small scale can influence how demand for certain products could be changed.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_185\" style=\"width: 691px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-185\" class=\"wp-image-185 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/files\/2021\/02\/oilPalmPlantation.png?resize=685%2C391\" alt=\"\" width=\"685\" height=\"391\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/files\/2021\/02\/oilPalmPlantation.png?w=685 685w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/files\/2021\/02\/oilPalmPlantation.png?resize=300%2C171 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/files\/2021\/02\/oilPalmPlantation.png?resize=220%2C126 220w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 685px) 100vw, 685px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-185\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Oil palm plantation in Cigudeg, West Java, Indonesia. Image: Achmad Rabin Taim, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons<\/p><\/div>\n<p><strong>Effects of deforestation on the ecosystem<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>As most of us know, tropical rainforests are home to swathes of native species that aren\u2019t found anywhere else on the planet and not to mention, the existence of indigenous people who live in balance with these forests to survive.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>With the current trend, an extreme-case scenario predicts that by 2050, that South-East Asia would lose as much as 5.2 million hectares of forests [5]. This equates to around 10 million football pitches!<\/li>\n<li>Two-thirds of the world\u2019s species live in these tropical forests, and the trees contribute to the storage of carbon \u2013 68% of the global carbon stock. [5]<\/li>\n<li>The removal of the forests this century has resulted in the endangerment of countless species, while a handful are now completely extinct in the wild, such as the Spix\u2019s Macaw \u2013 the inspiration for the 2011 movie, Rio. [6]<strong style=\"font-size: 13px\">\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>South-East Asia and Palm Oil<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Both commercial and subsistence agriculture contribute to over 70% of deforestation across the tropics [1], and over a 12-year period from 2000 to 2012, satellite imagery was used to calculate a trend for deforestation rates; with the tropics losing around 2100 km2\/year [2].<\/p>\n<p>Using this data, we need to highlight the leading driver of this deforestation.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>In one study of drivers, areas of tropical rainforest cleared for palm oil plantations were found to be the single most destructive driver of deforestation across Indonesia [3]. Looking at Figure 2, we can see that 23% of all deforestation comes solely from oil palm plantations. This is a huge number for one single product, compared to the meagre 15% contributed by all small-scale agriculture across the nation. [3]<\/li>\n<li>The islands of Indonesia and Malaysia churn out 84% of the world\u2019s palm oil, dominating the global market and it is expected that the demand will keep growing as these developing nations progress economically. [4]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>To conclude, we know that many large trans-national corporations use palm oil in their products, with it contained in over half of all packaged products! Huge companies such as Colgate-Palmolive, Kellogg\u2019s, Nestle and Heinz \u2013 to name a few \u2013 are guilty of using palm oil.<\/p>\n<p>With this in mind, the population across the globe needs to make changes to diets and fashion habits, with the aim of reducing demand for resources such as palm oil which in turn could make a huge impact on the rate of deforestation; and hopefully the developing nations behind the mass export of palm oil can find alternative industries to support their economies.<\/p>\n<p>&#8212;<\/p>\n<p><strong>References<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>[1] &#8211; Gibbs et al 2010, Hosonuma et al 2012, as cited in Austin et al 2019 \u2013 What causes deforestation in Indonesia? \u2013 Environmental Research Letters Vol. 14, Number 2.<\/p>\n<p>[2] \u2013 Hansen et al 2013 \u2013 High-Resolution Global Maps of 21<sup>st<\/sup> Century Forest Cover Change \u2013 Vol. 342, Issue 6160, pp. 850-853<\/p>\n<p>[3] &#8211; Austin et al 2019 \u2013 What Causes Deforestation in Indonesia? \u2013 Environmental Research Letters Vol. 14, Number 2.<\/p>\n<p>[4] \u2013 OECD\/FAO Agricultural Outlook 2015 \u2013 as cited in Dilip Khatiwada, Carl Palmen &amp; Semida Silveira 2018 \u2013 Evaluating the palm oil demand in Indonesia: production trends, yields, and emerging issues.<\/p>\n<p>[5] \u2013 Estoque et al 2019 \u2013 The future of South East Asia\u2019s forests \u2013 Nature Communications 10, Article Number 1829<\/p>\n<p>[6] \u2013 Sarah Ruiz 2020 \u2013 4 Species That Went Extinct This Century Because of Forest Loss [Online] \u2013 Available at: https:\/\/blog.globalforestwatch.org\/data-and-research\/four-species-that-went-extinct-this-century-because-of-forest-loss\/ &#8211; Accessed [01\/12\/2020]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by George Walton &#8211;\u00a0 In this post, we\u2019re going to explore one of the most destructive and large-scale global environmental issues \u2013 palm oil.\u00a0 The removal of native trees makes way for oil palm plantations \u2013 in return, having a devastating effect on the local biodiversity. We will take a look at one of the&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1374,"featured_media":185,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[23,45,17,46],"class_list":["post-193","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-deforestation","tag-biodiversity","tag-deforestation","tag-sustainability","tag-tropical-forest"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/files\/2021\/02\/oilPalmPlantation.png?fit=685%2C391","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1374"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=193"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":194,"href":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193\/revisions\/194"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/185"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/lec101blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}