RAINFOREST AND FRIES PLEASE!

It’s hard to understand how much rain forest we all “eat” every single day. Even if you’re not a burger and fries girl, ingredients that are literally eating away our precious rain forests, are likely to show up in your life regardless – even if you’re vegan! A new report has just been released by the Forest Footprint Disclosure about how global business is destroying the rainforest, particularly in the Amazon. The worst offenders are beef, soy, and palm oil. Beef obviously finds it’s way to our fast-food restaurants, soy is largely grown to feed livestock across the globe and palm oil is found in everything from cookies to skin care products.

So why is deforestation so bad for our planet? People have got to eat (most Americans love to eat beef), and with a population expanding exponentially, there’s no more room for cattle to craze. So in order to meet demand, enormous areas of the rainforest are shaved to the ground to provide room for the cows (80% of the forest is cut solely for beef production).  This is one of the main reasons why we might want to cut down considerably on how much beef we eat. Almost as large, are the areas of rainforest that are cleared to grow soy crops – this food isn’t for the locals or even for humans, it’s simply grown and shipped across the globe to fatten up cows for our burgers – another reason to cut the beef.

Deforestation accounts for over 20% of global carbon emissions and as we all know, trees are the lungs of the earth – without them, we’re dead. I love what The Forest Disclosure Project is doing. They are backed by powerful financial institutions and are asking huge companies to disclose their “Forest Footprint” (total amount of deforestation caused by their company). Many companies did not respond to this organization, probably because supply chains are so complex, that many don’t even know.

The Forest Disclosure project is another way for us as consumers to get an idea of the true sustainable commitment of a given company. With every company now touting it’s eco-friendly initiatives, it’s important to be able to sort the green-warriors from the green-washers. Top performers in sustainability include BMW, L’Oreal, and Marks & Spencer (which happens to be the best store for lingerie on the planet!).