Girl Scouts Not Dying For A Cookie
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto 
on 04.23.08
Leisa Thompson/ Ann Arbor News
One of the side-effects of the race to print TRANSFAT FREE! on the side of every package is a big boom in production of palm oil, on plantations cut from the rainforest home of orangutans. 12 year old girl scouts Madison Vorva and Rhiannon Tomtishen of Ann Arbor, Michigan have stopped selling Girl Guide Cookies, and have started an education drive, website and petition against palm oil.
Palm oil production leads to conflict between orangutans and people, the girls said. "We've seen pictures of orangutans set afire and beaten.You really just want to reach out and do all that you can to help save them," Madison told the Ann Arbor News.
The Girl Guides aren't amused, noting that cookie sales are a vital part of the organization's funding. They also say that the baker "has committed to using palm oil grown on rehabilitated or previously cleared land rather than on land that is deforested specifically for palm-oil production" with no word on how they can tell. ::Ann Arbor News
See lots of TreeHugger on palm oil:
Everything connects: How getting rid of trans-fats kills orangutans
Palm Oil: A Rainforest in your Shopping
Major Campaign against Palm Oil, Destroyer of Orangutans
Indonesia Fastest Forest Destroyer
Mainstream Media Discovers that Palm Oil no Panacea :
UN says Palm Oil Industry is Wiping out the Orang Utan
And since they deluge us with fake letters every time we write a post, we will save them the trouble by linking to the astroturfers at the ::Palm Oil Truth Foundation.
Follow @TreeHugger on Twitter & get our headlines with @TH_rss!
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One of my favorite movie line of all time is in the big screen adaptation of the Adams Family when Christina Ricci asked: "Are they made from real Girl Scouts?"
It's in that spirit that every time a girl scout tries to sell me cookies, I take one look at the box, frown at the ingredients, sending her off crying.
Our local Girl Scout office a few years ago was caught embezzling... The Girl Scouts of America should have made their cookies organic a long time ago!!!
I was horrified when reading the nutritional information on the side of a box of girl scout cookies - for one type,serving of 2 cookies contains 25% of the RDA of fat - for an adult. And they're marketed towards childeren. There are obviously many things wrong with these particular cookies.
These two young ladies are to be commended for taking a stand and acting on their beliefs. We can only hope thousands of other Girl Scouts will demonstrate the same clarity of thought and steadfast determination.
Orangutan Outreach is a non-profit organization dedicated to saving wild orangutans and making people aware of the palm oil crisis. We often have a difficult time getting our point across to corporations that use palm oil, but when the message comes from girls like Madison and Rhiannon, it is especially powerful. I believe that the companies that produce the Girl Scouts' cookies will listen to them. Let's just hope they are willing to do the right thing and eliminate the palm oil from their cookies!
Best of luck girls-- and thanks for blogging on it, Treehugger!
Richard Zimmerman
Director, Orangutan Outreach
http://redapes.org
Reach out and save the orangutans!
Hats off to the young ladies and shame on GSA for not vetting their cookies better than this. And shame on them again for sticking by a provider that won't change per customer demand. I'mm sure they could find someone willing to do the right thing if they looked about instead of green washing the current supplier...
It's about time that more people take the time to read the ingredients in Girl Scout cookies and other foods that they ingest. I, too, have purchased cookies from girl scouts in my family even though I knew some of the ingredients were harmful to humans also - not only orangutans.
Regardless, oil topic and cutting tropical forest
in Kalimantan (pálm oil for cosmetics/Unilever)green activists are basically true.
Everything have to be balanced.
I think that the best answer to that is to start natural re-forestation program co-financed by Unilever.