Just found this podcast on The Guardian online where John Sauven, executive director of Greenpeace, explains why the environmental group holds Unilever responsible for the destruction of Indonesian rainforests and the killing of endangered orang-utans:
What Greenpeace says?
- if Unilever sorts out its supplies the company could fix deforestation
- Unilever tries to upscale its best practices in order to avoid lights on its non-green aspects
What Unilever says?
- Has joined the Sustainable Roundtable on PalmOil created in 2002 to deal with palmoil supply chain; and states that they are committed to find a sustainable solution (such as certification for the palmoil). Demand for palmoil has exploded; because of China and India larger consumption; and also because of the biofuels use.
What Greenpeace says #2?
- Unilever didn't deny the accusations from Greenpeace; they did not track the origin from palmoil used by them (data is all mixed up). Mr. Sauven says that Unilever has been committed to the roundtable (SRPO) but that this roundtable has just been used to cover business as usual practices from a lot of its members. Unilever knows for a long time about the problems but members, some quite clearly involved in breaking Indonesian laws, contributed to deforestation and wiping out the orangutang's habitats, were not kicked out of the roundtable.
- Mr. Sauven say that time has come and Unilever needs to put up or shut up. Because it cannot go on claiming it is sustainable company, while at the same time they do not take responsibility for where that supply is coming from.
- Why Unilever? Every corporation involved in food or cosmetics is potentially consuming/buying palmoil. But Unilever joined the roundtable and was aware about everything that goes on related to palmoil. So there was no excuse to accept the conditions in place; and besides that, it has a lot of high profile product lines whom have palmoil as basic input.
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