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Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION

Kit Kat, Coffee Crisp threat to rainforest?

Forestry firm supplies palm oil for chocolate

By: Mike De Souza

Posted: 03/18/2010 1:00 AM | Comments: 0 (including replies)

TATAN SYUFLANA / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS ARCHIVES Enlarge Image

Indonesian activists demonstrate in Jakarta over threat to orangutan population.

OTTAWA -- It might give you a break in a busy workday, but a new pressure campaign launched on Wednesday says a Kit Kat chocolate bar is actually a threat to rainforests and endangered orangutans.

The campaign, launched by Greenpeace International, warns popular chocolate bars such as Kit Kat and Coffee Crisp use palm oil from Sinar Mas, one of the largest forestry companies in Indonesia. The supplier operates in regions where rainforests and peatlands are being replaced by palm tree plantations that eliminate natural habitat and reduce carbon dioxide sinks, which help keep the atmosphere clean and fight global warming.

Nestle responded to the campaign within hours, announcing it would follow in the footsteps of other companies such as Unilever and Kraft by cancelling contracts with Sinar Mas. The Switzerland-based company has also committed to using only "certified sustainable palm oil" in its products by 2015.

"We will continue to pressure our suppliers to eliminate any sources of palm oil which are related to rainforest destruction and to provide valid guarantees of traceability as quickly as possible," Nestle said on its website. "We will not portray palm oil as free of such oils unless such guarantees are clear and reliable."

Greenpeace Canada senior campaigner Stephanie Goodwin said the environmental group does not oppose the use of palm oil or vegetable oil in chocolate bars, but is urging the industry to develop higher standards to ensure production is sustainable.

"Despite today's announcement, Nestle will still be using palm oil from Sinar Mas in Kit Kats, because they'll still be getting it from their other suppliers," said Goodwin. "The Greenpeace campaign will continue until Nestle has cut the Sinar Mas group from its supply chain completely."

In the meantime, she said, consumers could write to chocolate companies urging them to take action. As an alternative, she said, they could also buy certified organic chocolate or bars that don't contain vegetable or palm oil.

"We're not suggesting that people should stop eating chocolate bars, we think that everyone should eat chocolate at Easter," she said. "We think that consumers and the public need to be sending strong messages all the way back to Sinar Mas, saying: 'Change the way you do business.' "

Four per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions are estimated to be coming from the destruction of the Indonesian rainforests, Goodwin added. Greenpeace estimated Nestle's annual use of palm oil had almost doubled over the past three years, to 320,000 tonnes, and its online campaign, launched at greenpeace.org/kitkat, included a video mocking Nestle's "take a break" slogan for the Kit Kat bars.

-- Canwest News Service

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition March 18, 2010 A11

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