MPOC Bloggers meet | Palm oil and its importance
21:43
It has been quite a long time that we attended a meet
up/event which educates us about the general crisis we are facing as
individuals with respect to world order etc. rather than learning more and more
about the thing we know best: food.
There are some serious events happening across the globe
related to food security, war, terrorism etc. and it is a sad fact that most
multi facet organizations and developed nations use food security as a tool to
manipulate countries with huge populations (like ours!).
On the same line, we were a part of a bloggers meet on the
topic of palm oil at The Vivanta by Taj-M.G. Road. It was more of an
informative session than being a bloggers meet as there were an array of topics
discussed revolving around the acceptance of palm oil and strategies
implemented to make sure than even though on a daily basis we consume goods
containing palm oil, we don’t use it because of the idea of apparent harm attached to it.
The above paragraph sounds paradoxical doesn’t it? It
should, because it is! Children are always told that we should have a diet
based on natural food mostly ones growing out of the earth. Palm trees most
definitely fit the description and the yield of palm oil is consumed by over a
million people directly and they are still alive and well. So, the question is
what makes us delusional about this topic?
This meet was organized by #MPOC or the Malaysian Palm Oil
Council and Malaysia is thriving on Palm Oil because it has numerous advantages
over other varieties of oil. Over 70% of Malaysia is now covered with palm
plantations which not only give them great yield but also maintains forest
cover. There are many reasons behind the adoption of palm oil and a few are as
follows:
Palm oil has a very long shelf life, so with minimum
preservatives it lasts a very long time. It has no odour and taste so it
enhances the taste of the food itself rather than imparting its own taste like
other oil varieties. Although in some cases the taste of oil is required, for
the times it is not palm oil is the best bet. There are 2 significant
advantages that palm oil has: Firstly, the entire tree can be put to use. The
leaves are used in making fibres, the wood is used in various ways, the oil is
used for cooking, lubrication and the dredges and other parts are used in palm
bio-diesel which is a renewable source of energy. Secondly, production of oil
is more than any other oil source. Using the same area of land, palm trees
produce 10X oil than most other oil varieties. In our time of population
explosion, this is mandatory for countering the effects of de-forestation.
Lastly, it is as healthy as olive oil, cholesterol free,
fully bio-degradable and non-GMO! It is shocking how the business tactics of a
powerful few control the strings of billions of people—not only giving them the
provision of quality products but also restricting them from accessing
something which has more advantage and is cheaper. Plus, this has the power to
minimize our national vegetable oil imports because of its high production
rate.
Although we might not use palm oil for daily cooking use, we
are consuming it on a day to day basic in fried foods, cakes & pastries,
chocolates, cosmetics etc. because its smooth and creamy texture gives a good
mouth feel. (Under the vegetable oils section, in most products palm oil is
used)
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| Ms. Bhavna Shah (Regional Head of MPOC for India & Sri Lanka) |
Our advice to everyone is not to follow blindly. There are
foreign forces at play which are pulling our strings just like they used to a
century ago. Now it is time for us as knowledgeable and smart people to fight
back with logic not sentiment. We must embrace what is best for the environment
and for us rather than satisfy a particular entities business interests.
The tagline for #MPOC goes by: A gift from nature, a gift
for life. It is time we validate this and start thinking about our planet for a
change because at the current rate, we might have a dead planet in the next 50
years!
That’s all from our side.
This might not be one of our normal posts but is quite
important nonetheless.
We’ll be back next time with the usual stuff so, till
then—stay tuned and bon apetit!
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