Oil Palm Plantations Threaten People and the Environment

The agrofuel aftermath: A scene of devastation after the BBC Oil Palm company bulldozed villagers’ food crops and planted oil palm seedlings on their land in Sebauh, Sarawak. Debra Erenberg

PAN & Rainforest Action Network Investigation

by Debra Erenberg

Malaysia—In April, PAN North America invited me to participate in a fact-finding mission to Sarawak—Malaysia’s largest state. Since the U.S. imports about 90% of its palm oil from Malaysia, this was an opportunity to see firsthand the social and environmental costs of the palm oil used in our supermarket foods. (Rainforest Action Network has identified 178 products containing palm oil, ranging from candybars and cookies to popcorn and “organic” crackers.)

Our fact-finding mission (co-sponsored by Pesticide Action Network Asia and the Pacific, Tenaganita, and the Sarawak Dayak Iban Association) drove home how the West’s insatiable hunger for processed foods—and its increasing appetite for food-based “agrofuels”—is ravaging forest communities. Palm oil, one of the cheapest agrofuel sources, is actually fueling global warming. Indonesia is the world’s third-largest greenhouse gas emitter (behind the U.S. and China) due largely to the destruction of forests to establish palm oil plantations.

Palm oil plantations in Sarawak and elsewhere use herbicides like paraquat dichloride, which has poisoned rivers, depriving local communities of clean water and fish. Though there is a movement for more responsible agriculture, identified with the Roundtable for Sustainable Palm Oil, we found no evidence of appropriate development during our investigation.

Roughly half of Sarawak’s 2.2 million inhabitants belong to Indigenous groups collectively known as the Dayak. Although the Dayak have lived in the area for millennia, these communities can only gain legal rights to their land by proving continuous use and occupation since 1958. This is difficult because traditional farming practices require that farmers periodically leave fields fallow.

Rubber and fruit trees can serve as proof of communal use. But in one Dayak community I visited, the state used helicopters to look for evidence of community use. Because rubber and fruit trees grow beneath the taller rainforest trees, none were spotted. In several communities, villagers told me that palm oil companies received a “Provisional Lease” for the land and then used bulldozers to remove the rubber and fruit trees that would have served as proof of community land ownership. In one village near Bintulu, six houses were also bulldozed.

Near the coastal city of Bintulu, community members described how one oil palm company offered them 30% of its profits. The community had no legal representation and the villagers were invited to sign an “agreement” written in English, which they could neither speak nor read. It turned out that the agreement—signed with thumbprints—stipulated that villagers were “squatting” on company land and had agreed to dismantle their homes and leave.

In the Kampung Wawasan area, villagers told me that an oil palm company repeatedly sent thugs to pressure them to sell their land. Although they filed more than 20 reports, the police never came. That is, until April 14, when the village leader was arrested for possessing a pistol without a license—a charge community members say is false. Other villagers were asked to come in for questioning about the case, but when they complied, they were arrested on undisclosed charges.

Such abuses are all too common. As 173 land rights cases drag on in Sarawak’s courts, profitdriven corporations continue clear-cutting ancient rainforests that have been cultivated sustainably for centuries. And until issues of access to land are addressed fairly, people like the Dyak in countries throughout the Third World will not be able to feed themselves or preserve their communities.

U.S. agribusiness giants ADM, Bunge, and Cargill are the ABCs of rainforest destruction: They dominate the world markets for palm oil and soy crops that are grown on cleared rainforest lands.

My trip convinced me that U.S. consumers must hold these companies accountable for the abuses that lie hidden behind their products. RAN is looking forward to working with PAN North America to expose these abuses and to pressure U.S. agribusinesses to stop clearing rainforests and exploiting Indigenous communities.

^{Debra Erenberg is RAN’s Organizing Director.}

on the web

Learn more at http://RAN.org and http://TheProblemWithPalmOil.org