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I hate to remind everyone, but Nutella is Palm Oil with cocoa and hazlenut flavor. Of course, Nutella works to ensure all their palm oil has some veneer of sus

I hate to remind everyone, but Nutella is Palm Oil with cocoa and hazlenut flavor. Of course, Nutella works to ensure all their palm oil has some veneer of sustainability, but the fact is the more of the planet that eats it, the more palms need to be planted.

merreborn 9y ago
For what it's worth... > Ferrero... reached its goal of using only palm oil that has been certified by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil... Nutella’s palm oil comes mostly from Malaysia, as well as from Brazil, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea, according to reports. > Greenpeace, the environmental advocacy group, told Quartz in a statement that it opposes a boycott of products with palm oil because “a blanket boycott of this agricultural crop will not solve problems in its production.” https://qz.com/430450/no-you-dont-have-to-boycott-nutella-for-the-environment-says-greenpeace/ https://qz.com/430450/no-you-dont-have-to-boycott-nutella-fo...
- nerpderp83 9y ago
  > Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil ensuring there is profitability in every jar!
- rorykoehler 9y ago
  Malaysian palm oil is anything but sustainable. What utter BS.
- pcrh 9y ago
  "Malaysia" includes Sarawak, which is on the same island as Borneo and home to about 8,000 orangutans who are also threatened.
- sleepyhead 9y ago
  Well the problem here is that the Roundtable of "Sustainable" Palm oil has HQ in Kuala Lumpur. Malaysia is one of the most corrupt countries in the world, particularly so with politicians who deal with palm oil. Sarawak (Borneo) have seen most of the huge jungle being converted to palm oil plantation because they basically had a dictator in charge for thirty years who enriched himself and his family from it. So this organisation would have very little possibility to actively make improvements due to the political conditions in Malaysia. They don't really have free and fair elections - something that people are trying to change but have been jailed for. The main opposition leader is for example in jail. While it is better to buy from RSPO than non-RSPO sources it is far from sustainable.
on_and_off 9y ago
There is an option that is both organic and palm oil free : Nocciolata . I have used it to replace Nutella several years ago. It is probably a bit costlier but since I only need a pot / year, that's not really an issue.
- dflock 9y ago
  Link? How is it better?
  - jacobolus 9y ago
    From what I understand gianduja nocciolato is just the generic name for a chocolate + hazelnut mixture traditionally made in Piedmont. So this would be some kind of Nutella-like spread sold under some local/artisanal brand, made from like 80% hazelnuts + chocolate, instead of the 60% sugar + 20% palm oil + 20% hazelnuts and chocolate in Nutella. (I imagine ingredients vary somewhat from brand to brand though; check the label.) It’s more expensive because higher hazelnut and cacao content are more expensive ingredients than sugar or palm oil. It’s also less spreadable and much less sweet. A web search turns up e.g. http://foodloversodyssey.com/2011/07/history-chocolate-in-turin-gianduja-and-more/ http://foodloversodyssey.com/2011/07/history-chocolate-in-tu...
  - on_and_off 9y ago
    >Link? It is a simple google search away : http://www.nocciolatausa.com/ http://www.nocciolatausa.com/ I bought it in Europe so it looks like it is widely available. >How is it better? No palm oil for one. On top of the environmental problems, it looks like it is not great for your health either, so I avoid it. The composition in general looks more healthy than Nutella and the taste is great so I did not really overthink this.
newnewpdro 9y ago
Once upon a time Nutella did not use Palm oil, HFCS, or plastic containers. It used to quickly separate in the jar, always requiring thorough stirring prior to use, much like single-ingredient peanut butter spreads. Those days are long gone. Though I hear in europe they still get Nutella with sugar and glass jars. I'm not sure if they escape the Palm oil there as well. I grew up eating Nutella sandwiches in the USA, at a time when you couldn't find it anywhere except specialty Italian grocers. The current product found on shelves in the USA is drastically different experientially speaking from what I was fed as a kid. It's not very good anymore IMHO.
- realusername 9y ago
  > I'm not sure if they escape the Palm oil there as well. No it's palm oil as well in Europe.
flycaliguy 9y ago
Also account for palm oil as cattle feed. I know for a fact that my dairy farming uncle uses palm oil in feed.
- robocat 9y ago
  Incorrect. After the oil is removed, the remaining crushed matter is sold for cattle feed, instead if being just waste.
  - flycaliguy 9y ago
    Pretty sure my uncle mixes it in.
deadghost 9y ago
Just eat your nutella. Just Indonesia is 260M people, approaching the population of the US. Palm oil is the cheapest and most widely used oil in all of South East Asia. From what I'm told, Palm is very efficient and produces a lot of oil and isn't necessarily bad. The issue is corrupt governments failing to preserve their people's natural heritage as plantations encroach on nature. I doubt a few Europeans cutting down on nutella will make much of a difference when the people in SEA consume huge quantities of it themselves. I checked out the orangutans in Sumatra and you can see the palm plantations encroaching into the jungle. Locals told me they consume a lot of the river water and makes the entire area warmer. Although the area had the fortune of being a natural reserve, I still saw trucks grabbing aggregate from parts of the river that were not included. Oh and if you were in SEA around 2 years ago, the ridiculous haze was from people burning wetlands to plant more palm. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southeast_Asian_haze https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southeast_Asian_haze
- biztos 9y ago
  I was in Singapore for a week of the Haze. I was kind of amazed it was allowed to happen, but the local take (as told to me anyway) was that Indonesia was way too powerful for Singapore to force them to do anything they didn't want to do, and the corruption was such that even fighting the fires effectively wasn't something they particularly wanted to do... and forget about stopping the planters from burning recklessly in the first place. Not sure if that's accurate but that's what local folks told me.
  - sleepyhead 9y ago
    It's a mix of corruption, poor governance and a powerful palm oil industry in Indonesia. If the USA was next to Indonesia they would have power to influence but Singapore, despite it being a successful country, do not have much power to influence big Indonesia.
- sleepyhead 9y ago
  so your argument is: 1) guns don't kill people, people do. 2) some other people are worse so just keep doing the bad thing I'm also quite puzzled about your conclusion of buying palm oil while also stating many of the negative effects. What you are saying is that there is no point of trying to improve anything because it will have little effect. With that attitude surely no changes will be made. You are right that it's more efficient to produce palm oil compared to alternatives. But that's not really a good argument when the production is done the way it is in these corrupt countries.
fvdessen 9y ago
The USA consumes only 1.8% of the world's total palm oil production. The EU 10%. The Nutella consumption effect on orangutans is completely anecdotic. Not everything bad that happens on this planet is the responsability of the western man.
- newnewpdro 9y ago
  Citations needed. Also, what %age of palm oil production is by western corporations?
  - sleepyhead 9y ago
    It's correct that EU and US are not the biggest consumers - they do use a lot though. India and China are the main consumers. And their imports are increasing. Not sure how accurate these stats are but here are some numbers: https://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/profile/hs92/1511/ https://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/profile/hs92/1511/

merreborn 9y ago

For what it's worth... > Ferrero... reached its goal of using only palm oil that has been certified by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil... Nutella’s palm oil comes mostly from Malaysia, as well as from Brazil, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea, according to reports. > Greenpeace, the environmental advocacy group, told Quartz in a statement that it opposes a boycott of products with palm oil because “a blanket boycott of this agricultural crop will not solve problems in its production.” https://qz.com/430450/no-you-dont-have-to-boycott-nutella-for-the-environment-says-greenpeace/ https://qz.com/430450/no-you-dont-have-to-boycott-nutella-fo...

nerpderp83 9y ago
> Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil ensuring there is profitability in every jar!
rorykoehler 9y ago
Malaysian palm oil is anything but sustainable. What utter BS.
pcrh 9y ago
"Malaysia" includes Sarawak, which is on the same island as Borneo and home to about 8,000 orangutans who are also threatened.
sleepyhead 9y ago
Well the problem here is that the Roundtable of "Sustainable" Palm oil has HQ in Kuala Lumpur. Malaysia is one of the most corrupt countries in the world, particularly so with politicians who deal with palm oil. Sarawak (Borneo) have seen most of the huge jungle being converted to palm oil plantation because they basically had a dictator in charge for thirty years who enriched himself and his family from it. So this organisation would have very little possibility to actively make improvements due to the political conditions in Malaysia. They don't really have free and fair elections - something that people are trying to change but have been jailed for. The main opposition leader is for example in jail. While it is better to buy from RSPO than non-RSPO sources it is far from sustainable.

on_and_off 9y ago

There is an option that is both organic and palm oil free : Nocciolata . I have used it to replace Nutella several years ago. It is probably a bit costlier but since I only need a pot / year, that's not really an issue.

dflock 9y ago
Link? How is it better?
- jacobolus 9y ago
  From what I understand gianduja nocciolato is just the generic name for a chocolate + hazelnut mixture traditionally made in Piedmont. So this would be some kind of Nutella-like spread sold under some local/artisanal brand, made from like 80% hazelnuts + chocolate, instead of the 60% sugar + 20% palm oil + 20% hazelnuts and chocolate in Nutella. (I imagine ingredients vary somewhat from brand to brand though; check the label.) It’s more expensive because higher hazelnut and cacao content are more expensive ingredients than sugar or palm oil. It’s also less spreadable and much less sweet. A web search turns up e.g. http://foodloversodyssey.com/2011/07/history-chocolate-in-turin-gianduja-and-more/ http://foodloversodyssey.com/2011/07/history-chocolate-in-tu...
- on_and_off 9y ago
  >Link? It is a simple google search away : http://www.nocciolatausa.com/ http://www.nocciolatausa.com/ I bought it in Europe so it looks like it is widely available. >How is it better? No palm oil for one. On top of the environmental problems, it looks like it is not great for your health either, so I avoid it. The composition in general looks more healthy than Nutella and the taste is great so I did not really overthink this.

newnewpdro 9y ago

Once upon a time Nutella did not use Palm oil, HFCS, or plastic containers. It used to quickly separate in the jar, always requiring thorough stirring prior to use, much like single-ingredient peanut butter spreads. Those days are long gone. Though I hear in europe they still get Nutella with sugar and glass jars. I'm not sure if they escape the Palm oil there as well. I grew up eating Nutella sandwiches in the USA, at a time when you couldn't find it anywhere except specialty Italian grocers. The current product found on shelves in the USA is drastically different experientially speaking from what I was fed as a kid. It's not very good anymore IMHO.

realusername 9y ago
> I'm not sure if they escape the Palm oil there as well. No it's palm oil as well in Europe.

flycaliguy 9y ago

Also account for palm oil as cattle feed. I know for a fact that my dairy farming uncle uses palm oil in feed.

robocat 9y ago
Incorrect. After the oil is removed, the remaining crushed matter is sold for cattle feed, instead if being just waste.
- flycaliguy 9y ago
  Pretty sure my uncle mixes it in.

deadghost 9y ago

Just eat your nutella. Just Indonesia is 260M people, approaching the population of the US. Palm oil is the cheapest and most widely used oil in all of South East Asia. From what I'm told, Palm is very efficient and produces a lot of oil and isn't necessarily bad. The issue is corrupt governments failing to preserve their people's natural heritage as plantations encroach on nature. I doubt a few Europeans cutting down on nutella will make much of a difference when the people in SEA consume huge quantities of it themselves. I checked out the orangutans in Sumatra and you can see the palm plantations encroaching into the jungle. Locals told me they consume a lot of the river water and makes the entire area warmer. Although the area had the fortune of being a natural reserve, I still saw trucks grabbing aggregate from parts of the river that were not included. Oh and if you were in SEA around 2 years ago, the ridiculous haze was from people burning wetlands to plant more palm. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southeast_Asian_haze https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southeast_Asian_haze

biztos 9y ago
I was in Singapore for a week of the Haze. I was kind of amazed it was allowed to happen, but the local take (as told to me anyway) was that Indonesia was way too powerful for Singapore to force them to do anything they didn't want to do, and the corruption was such that even fighting the fires effectively wasn't something they particularly wanted to do... and forget about stopping the planters from burning recklessly in the first place. Not sure if that's accurate but that's what local folks told me.
- sleepyhead 9y ago
  It's a mix of corruption, poor governance and a powerful palm oil industry in Indonesia. If the USA was next to Indonesia they would have power to influence but Singapore, despite it being a successful country, do not have much power to influence big Indonesia.
sleepyhead 9y ago
so your argument is: 1) guns don't kill people, people do. 2) some other people are worse so just keep doing the bad thing I'm also quite puzzled about your conclusion of buying palm oil while also stating many of the negative effects. What you are saying is that there is no point of trying to improve anything because it will have little effect. With that attitude surely no changes will be made. You are right that it's more efficient to produce palm oil compared to alternatives. But that's not really a good argument when the production is done the way it is in these corrupt countries.

fvdessen 9y ago

The USA consumes only 1.8% of the world's total palm oil production. The EU 10%. The Nutella consumption effect on orangutans is completely anecdotic. Not everything bad that happens on this planet is the responsability of the western man.

newnewpdro 9y ago
Citations needed. Also, what %age of palm oil production is by western corporations?
- sleepyhead 9y ago
  It's correct that EU and US are not the biggest consumers - they do use a lot though. India and China are the main consumers. And their imports are increasing. Not sure how accurate these stats are but here are some numbers: https://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/profile/hs92/1511/ https://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/profile/hs92/1511/