On 25th June I emailed the Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, to protest against the inclusion of Poul Polman, a Unilever executive, in the official UK government delegation to the Rio+20 climate change talks.
A few days ago (ie nearly two months later) some poor sap in the “Customer Contact Unit” in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) emailed me a non-reply. I didn’t know Defra was a shop or business (isn’t that usually where you find customers?). I am most definitely not a customer of Defra, which is a government department working on behalf of the “public” or “citizens”.
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Please email Deutsche Bank asking them to honour their stated commitment to sustainability and pull out of underwriting palm oil giant corporation FELDA’s flotation on the Malaysian stock market.
The problem
Rainforest Rescue says:
“FELDA is the world’s largest palm oil trader. Since its foundation, FELDA has cut down hundreds of thousands of hectares of rainforest in order to create oil palm monocultures. Now the company wants to collect three billion dollars at the stock market in order to buy more land in Indonesia and Africa, to destroy the rainforest and to set up oil palm plantations.
In Malaysia there is a strong opposition against FELDA’s flotation and the land grabbing associated with it. “
Biofuel -also known as agrofuel- is one of those ideas that seemed great at first. Bio-diesel from soy oil or palm oil, and bio-ethanol from sugar cane, beet, wheat and corn sounded like good alternatives to the fossil fuels we use for transport and electricity generation.
But since we first starting hearing about biofuels, their drawbacks have become clear. In 2011, the Nuffield Council on Bioethics reported that:
“current UK and European policies encourage unethical practices”.
Please sign this Rainforest Rescue-drafted email and send it to the management of Nestlé, Unilever and Neste Oil, asking them to cancel their business relationship with the corporate group IOI.
Illegal rainforest clearance to make way for palm oil plantations
Rainforest Rescue reports that:
“one thousand people on the Indonesian island of Borneo have lost their forest. It was illegally cleared by the corporate group IOI that supplies Nestlé, Unilever and Neste Oil with palm oil. All three companies publicly pride themselves for their so-called “sustainability”.
Rainforest Rescue partner Nordin, head of the organization Save Our Borneo (SOB), has collected plenty of watertight evidence against the criminals. He is preparing to file a case and the local government is backing him. However, to prevent more damage elsewhere, the palm oil Mafia’s profit stream has to be cut off. This is where Nordin needs our support.
Please call on Nestlé, Unilever and Neste Oil to cancel their business relationship with IOI.”
For the first time at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the official UK delegation to Rio+20 includes business representatives. Presumably they are on the delegation because their companies – Aviva and Unilever – are ethical and use sustainable procurement and production methods.
The delegates from Unilever are Paul Polman, Chief Executive, and Migeul Pestana, Vice President, Global External Affairs. Aviva Investors has sent their Chief Executive, Paul Abberley and Dr Steve Waygood, Chief Responsible Investment Officer.
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