Girl Scouts boycott palm oil cookies
Two Girl Scouts in Ann Arbor, MI say that they're no longer willing to peddle the sugary and addictive treats, because they contain environmentally destructive ingredients. While completing their research to earn a Girl Scout Bronze Award, Madison Vorva and Rhiannon Tomtishen discovered that one of the most beloved -- and up until now guilt free -- brand of cookies has a major environmental dark side. They say that the ingredients inside Girl Scout cookies are killing the Indonesian rainforest. The culprit in this case is palm oil, the cultivation of which is responsible for the clearing of massive stretches of East Asian rainforests. Apparently, the girls found it particularly disturbing that the farming was endangering the habitat of Indonesian orangutans. Latching onto a sympathetic species is always a good way to promote conservation -- these are some smart Girl Scouts. They've got a website up and everything, very informative.
Palm oil has enjoyed a huge boom in popularity over the last few years because it contains no trans-fat. Since trans-fat was declared the root of all evil, palm oil has become one of the world's largest agricultural commodities.
The main problem is that it only grows in rainforest climes -- about 85% of the world's palm oil exports come from Africa, Malaysia, and Indonesia. Since the 70's, the area covered by oil palm plantations has grown by 3,000% in Indonesia, and by 1,200% in Malaysia. Click here to read more about why palm oil sucks.
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