What, even Nutella??!

300 football fields of rainforest destroyed every hour, massive devastation of eco-systems, homeless chimps and orangutans, child labour violations, unsustainable economies. This must all sound a bit too familiar, right?

If not, let’s trundle back to our own first world context. 12, 016 km away to be precise, an over-sized Tesco in a lively Dublin district. You are on your break from work and have less than 5 minutes to choose that perfect snack: Filling yet not too time consuming, tasty but not fatty, you’re freezing your ass off, so preferably stomach-warming. Then you see it: glorious royal blue packaging, enticing words, the promise of hot food quickly. It’s all you want and it’s only €2.50: Pot Noodle, you hero.

But suddenly, in a moment of rare abstraction, you decide you must read the ingredients. Your hands hurriedly turn the product over. Let’s get this over with. You scan through the list. Eyes stop. There it is, small yet unmistakable black print. You’re ruined. That’s it: no noodles. Bliss buster, party pooper, soirée sinker. A thousand curse words stream through your head but you know you can’t go back now. Those words can’t be un-read. Conscience has taken hold for better or worse: Palm oil you bastard.

It’s a no-holes barred kind of a deal I’m afraid ladies and gents, this one is in it for the long haul and the only course of action is denial. The boring thing is that doing the ‘right thing’ requires strength, resilience, morality, character and resourcefulness. I know, “yawn”. This is a product found in nearly everything one would buy in the food store; even the pharmacy, sadly, with the oils’ irritating ability to make that oh-so-desirable soft, smooth, pigmented lipstick.

Nonetheless, since that fateful day at work during a much coveted break, I have made the decision to desist from buying products containing palm. After reading the ingredients for the Pot Noodle and discovering the worst I now must compulsively always read ingredients. I no longer live in blissful ignorance. To buy products and, in so doing, knowingly concede with their dirty past, cannot be an option.

With this said, I am not, despite how it may seem, trying to sound irritatingly sanctimonious. Quite the opposite, I merely want to ponder how impossibly hard it is to fulfil a seemingly simple step into conscious living. Nearly every item of food that lay coquettishly in my path that day, inviting me into their economy of deceit, seemed to contain it. Needless to say I ended up departing with a cold pasta salad and an innocent smoothie. Disappointed yet oddly fulfilled.

I challenge you all to do the same. A form of lifestyle activism. One simple yet arguably effective method of forcing multi-national corporations to listen is by thwarting their ability to do business. They may have a god complex, but honestly, it’s us as consumers that hold the power in this particular game of privilege. Palm oil at present is a cheap yet frankly disgusting component of production and in a world where global warming means a lot more than just hotter summers, it must be stopped. Cutting down rainforests, in addition to all the other horrible side-effects of its existence, means destroying carbon sinks. A carbon sink effectively offsets carbon dioxide and all the drastic consequences that go hand in hand with climate change. I know we’re all well versed in those, so I’ll spare you. I have however, taken the liberty to attach a link to a wonderful site listing the palm oil free alternatives that do exist. You’re welcome!

http://www.orangutans.com.au/Orangutans-Survival-Information/Helping-you-buy-responsibly-Palm-oil-free-alternatives.aspx

#rant