I now have a very prompt reply letter received from the Customer Service Department of Marks & Spencer regarding the palm oil used in many of their supermarket products…
Once again, I am disappointed that this ‘own brand’ supermarket did not list its products that contain palm oil. If I don’t know which they are then I cannot avoid them, so I will have to follow that up with them. It would be easy to do, as they only sell ‘own brand products’.
Secondly, they have not outlined a date properly, that they will be listing palm oil as a specific oil in the ingredients listings on products. And since blends of oils are labelled as the generic ‘vegetable oil’ this is not helpful at all. It is a shame, as I enjoy their products.
See it by clicking on the images:
marks and spencer palm oil reply page 1
marks and spencer palm oil reply page 2
However, their commitments to changing to sustainable palm oil are better than some Supermarkets, but, as with all of them, the target of 2015 for the changeover (which I note is only written as an ‘aim’ and not a promise) will, again, be too late for the saviour of the Orangutans – there certainly would not be many left at that time if the progression and use of unsustainable palm oil from Borneo and Sumatra continue at the current rate.
I think their work with the WWF is really good, and I am very pleased to see that they are rehabilitating an area for Orangutans the size of 50 football pitches. However, I think the thing we should not forget here is that, in Sumatra alone, the area of 6 football pitches PER MINUTE are being destroyed for palm plantations, so actually stopping the plantation and purchase of the palm oil in the first place will be much more helpful. Those statistics are for Sumatra alone, let alone the deforestation across Borneo, by the way!
As with virtually all Supermarkets and Manufacturers, I will, once again, have to be writing back to Marks and Spencer to gain the information I asked for!
You can help – why don’t you write some letters too? You can see mine by CLICKING HERE
To see my general comments on my palm oil campaign Supermarket/Manufacturer replies CLICK HERE