Orangutan Conservation Initiative

Palm Oil and Orangutans

How palm-oil expansion harms orangutans, people and the climate.

How rainforest gets turned into a bar of soap.

Palm oil is productive and versatile but the destruction begins when industrial plantations replace tropical rainforest, then disappears from view as the oil is processed, mixed and sold through global supply chains.

85%+ Indonesia and Malaysia account for most of the world’s palm-oil production.
20+ orangutans In one documented case, workers said they were paid to kill orangutans treated as crop pests.
100,300 deaths A scientific model estimated this many premature deaths from the severe 2015 regional haze alone.
What a plantation replaces

Green is not the same as living forest.

A plantation can remain green from a distance while supporting only a fraction of the life found in natural rainforest. Rows of one commercial crop cannot replace seasonal food, nesting trees, layered canopy or connected wildlife corridors.

Palm oil plantation in Malaysia
Forest conversion removes the ecosystem before the commodity reaches the market.
Natural rainforest

A connected living system

  • Many tree and plant species
  • Seasonal fruit and nesting trees
  • Layered, connected canopy
  • Wildlife movement and genetic exchange
  • Carbon stored in forest and peat
Industrial plantation

A single commercial crop

  • Uniform rows of oil palms
  • No food and nesting options
  • Roads and drainage divide habitat
  • Displaced wildlife enters conflict zones
  • Drained peat becomes vulnerable to fire
The economic ledger

The profit stayed private. The damage did not.

Cheap clearing lowered immediate costs by moving the consequences onto other people, wildlife and the climate. Plantation companies and supply chains retained the economic benefit while communities, neighbouring countries and ecosystems absorbed the damage.

Orangutan amid burned and cleared forest habitat
Orangutans now become vulnerable to starvation and death if they survive the fires.
Economic benefit

Who Benefited?

  • Plantation owners and investors
  • Processors, traders and exporters
  • Manufacturers using a cheap, versatile ingredient
  • Retailers selling palm-dependent products
Externalised damage

Who Paid the Cost?

  • Orangutans and other wildlife losing habitat
  • Indonesian communities breathing hazardous smoke
  • People across Malaysia, Singapore and other parts of Southeast Asia exposed to regional haze
  • Children, older adults and people with heart or lung disease
  • The global climate as peat and forest carbon entered the atmosphere
2015 case study 100,300

estimated premature deaths linked to the severe regional haze

The year the smoke crossed borders

The profits crossed borders as well as the smoke.

Fires used to clear land spread through damaged forest and carbon-rich peat. On drained peatlands, fire could continue below the surface for weeks.

The 2015 fire season blanketed parts of Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore in hazardous haze. A peer-reviewed modelling study estimated about 100,300 premature deaths from that year alone.

Indonesia Malaysia Singapore
What the label actually means

Certification describes a supply-chain claim, but not a restored forest.

Certification can improve traceability and may reduce some new harm. It does not turn a plantation into rainforest, bring back displaced wildlife or erase destruction that already occurred.

  1. 01

    Credits

    No physical link required

    The palm oil in the product may not be certified. Credits support an equivalent certified volume elsewhere.

  2. 02

    Mass Balance

    Mixed physical supply

    Certified and conventional palm oil may be mixed while volumes are tracked administratively.

  3. 03

    Segregated

    Certified supply kept separate

    Certified material from multiple approved sources is kept apart from conventional material.

  4. 04

    Identity Preserved

    Clearest physical trace

    Certified material remains separate and traceable to one identified certified source.

Turn concern into action

Learn how palm oil hides on product labels.

The practical Palm Oil Guide explains direct palm-oil terms, possible derivatives and ways to reduce avoidable palm-oil use.

Read the Palm Oil Guide
Sources and scope

How this guide was prepared.

This page draws on peer-reviewed research into orangutan killing, regional haze, peat-fire emissions and palm-oil certification.