The Saint was not surprised to see yet another cheap publicity stunt being used by self-proclaimed environ-mental (with an emphasis on the mental) do-gooders - wanting to screw both our economy and those in developing countries as well.
Greenpeace’s latest protest is against the use of palm kernel animal feed. This has seen its activists chain themselves to a ship in Tauranga’s port and unveil banners that read "Fonterra Climate Crime", while calling for the Prime Minister to ban palm kernel feed imports. These “environmentalists” claim that palm oil plantations cause destruction to rainforests in Indonesia and Malaysia, and threaten species including orangutans.
However, to put a little more perspective into some of the warped claims being made by Greenpeace and other do-gooders, who would rather chain themselves to ships and create a media circus, than actually tell the full truth - the Saint recently came across an informative article written by one Dr Yusof Basiron of the Malaysian Palm Oil Council. Now your old mate is not completely naïve or gullible enough to think that Dr Basiron does not have an agenda in promoting the benefits of palm oil. Of course he does! Let’s face it the man is – after all – the paid mouthpiece and front man for the industry.
However, is his view any less blinkered than the anti-palm oil critics such as Greenpeace? I seriously doubt it. But then again, the media do not give the palm oil industry unfettered space in their newspapers and TV programmes to make all kinds of unsupported and outrageous statements that allows NGOs to impart maximum damage to the image of palm oil products.
The Saint read some facts about palm oil by provided the good doctor and then weigh them up against the claims being made by anti-palm oil campaigners to help give some balance to this debate. Here is what he came up with.
Palm oil is exported mainly from Malaysia and Indonesia and produced from legitimate agricultural lands - just like competing soybean or rapeseed oils. Palm oil has helped farmers in Malaysia and Indonesia climb out of the poverty trap. With oil palm as their main crop, farmers in Malaysia and Indonesia are now earning US $20 per day – compared to US$ 2 per day they were making 30 years ago when oil palm was not a major crop. (Perhaps the anti palm oil crusaders, would like to explain to farmers and plantation workers who want to have a better life just like their counterparts in developed nations, why they should not be able to!).
Greenpeace’s campaign against the use of palm kernel extract (PKE) as an animal feed by the dairy industry is based on claims that demand for PKE by New Zealand dairy farmers helps cause deforestation in Indonesia and Malaysia. Yet, the Greenies neglect to explain that PKE is actually only a by-product - even a waste product - of producing palm oil. The fact is that until it was found that PKE could be actually fed to cows - it was thrown away! So in fact, PKE use by NZ farmers makes no difference to forests being cut down in Asia, as the palm oil is still being produced anyway!
So is not the use of PKE actually making the production of palm oil a more efficient, productive, sustainable and carbon friendly product? The Saint thought greenies loved these kinds of buzz words. Perhaps if palm oil was able to be used to fuel trains then it would get the green tick. (Why do smelly hippies like trains so much?)
Another point the anti-palm oil crusaders forget to mention is that NZ’s natural forests were mostly wiped in the 19th and 20th centuries. These natural forests were replaced with grazing land, to produce milk, meat, and wool – which are now the country’s main exports. It begs the question: why is an agricultural product produced out of deforested land in New Zealand acceptable to Greenpeace, while an agricultural product from deforested land in Malaysia demonized? Both countries cleared land for agricultural purposes long ago. Seems to be both somewhat xenophobic, as well as economically illiterate
Meanwhile, by discouraging New Zealand farmers from using palm kernel meal as a supplementary feed for cows, this will damage the country’s fragile economy as milk yield and diary production will surely decline. (Palm kernel meal helps increase milk yield significantly). Without palm kernel meal, dairy farmers will have to supplement the feed shortage and overcome yield decline, by having larger grazing areas. This means more trees will need to be cut down and a much larger area needed to be deforested in New Zealand. What about reducing the country’s carbon footprint and enhancing New Zealand’s clean, green image!
So by wanting to ban PKE imports into New Zealand, one can fairly conclude that Greenpeace is not only racist, economically illiterate but also wants New Zealanders to cut down more trees! Ok, we better start the chainsaws.
See what happens when you fudge information to jump to self determined outcomes.
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