I heard that palm oil plantations deforest where orangutans live and I wouldn't want to destroy their habitat. Why can't America grow palm oil instead of so much corn and soy beans?

[–] Barley_Man@sopuli.xyz 2 points 3 days ago

Oil palms only grow in humid tropical environments. Environments that when left undisturbed would be tropical rainforest. Decoupling palm oil from deforestation is therefore very hard. Certified sustainable palmoil is simply from farmland that the farmers have proved not to have been deforested recently but that same land still has the potential to return to tropical rainforest after restoration.

Regarding America specifically probably only Hawaii could support it. But land there is scarce and is used for much higher value crops like fruit crops. Harvesting palm oil is also quite labor intensive since the fruit bunches are harvested manually. It therefore does not make economic sense to grow it in countries with high wages.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 0 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I absolutely love Orangutans, but then any action should be against the countries that fail to protect orangutans, not demonizing palm oil which dozens of countries depend on.
Demonizing palm oil reeks of industry manipulation, to protect agriculture in Europe or USA.

[–] robocall@lemmy.world 2 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Ok but you could be Mr monopoly guy behind the keyboard astroturfing your palm oil empire on Lemmy.

But seriously why isn't the USA producing palm oil?

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 2 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Not the right climate I suppose.

[–] robocall@lemmy.world 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I buy lots of produce from Canada. I wonder if we could greenhouse palm oil trees.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 2 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

I don't see why not, the problem is probably more to make it profitable, as the product would have to compete in a market of cheap palm oil from developing countries.
In greenhouses with artificial light, you can create whatever conditions you want, including a subtropical climate.