Iceland is to become the first major UK supermarket to pledge to remove palm oil from all its own-brand food, in a bid to halt the ongoing destruction of tropical rainforests in south-east Asia. The frozen food specialist has already removed the controversial ingredient from half of its own-label range, with the rest to be reformulated by the end of 2018. “Until Iceland can guarantee palm oil is not causing rainforest destruction, we are simply saying ‘no to palm oil’,” said Richard Walker, Iceland managing director, “We don’t believe there is such a thing as verifiably ‘sustainable’ palm oil available in the mass market.” Iceland’s pledge is that by the end of 2018, 100% of the supermarket’s own brand food lines will contain no palm oil, reducing demand by more than 500 tonnes per year. Iceland said that before this, palm oil was present in 130 products, or 10% of its own brand food.

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The Guardian