If you travel, PLEASE boycott Mandarin Oriental hotels! MO's parent company destroys rainforests
for palm oil.
Here's a corporate scorecard from the Union of Concerned Scientists:
http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/solutions/stop-deforestation/palm-oil-scorecard-company-profiles.html#.VWURr0bjW9I
http://grist.org/food/this-palm-oil-company-just-bulldozed-a-rainforest/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=EDIT%20Weekly&utm_campaign=weekly
In the last two years, a series of companies have made bold commitments to halt deforestation in their supply chains (see this story for the context). But producing products like palm oil without clearing ecologically important rainforest isn’t easy: It’s much easier to get rich quick by exploiting natural resources. Though most companies have agreed to rein in their operations, forests are still being razed.
According to Forest Heroes, the company responsible for this act of deforestation is Astra Agro Lestari. Astra has announced it is “pursuing” deforestation-free palm oil, but has not made a clear promise to stop cutting down the forest, as other companies have.
Activists have very little leverage on agriculture businesses, but they can affect the companies associated with agribusiness. So the activists are going after Mandarin Oriental Hotels, which is owned by the same conglomerate that owns Astra — a group called Jardine Matheson. The chair of this conglomerate, Ben Keswick, is also on a corporate governance board for Astra.
= new reply since forum marked as read
Good to know.
