Palm oil gets a bad press, but how bad is it really? Twenty eight year-old makeup artist Emmy Burbidge runs her own beauty salon in Somerset, and wants to know where palm oil comes from and how it’s made.
Palm oil is used in 70 percent of cosmetic products, and Emmy says that her customers are increasingly asking whether it’s in the products she’s using. She travels to Papua New Guinea to discover the truth about what’s in her makeup, and find out whether there’s a sustainable way of producing the oil used in making it.
Emmy visits the Bewani plantation, where new rainforest is being cut down to make space for palm, and local people are losing their livelihoods after unfulfilled promises of money, new homes and new schools in exchange for their land. The people who once lived off the forest now have to work on the plantations that replaced them in order to feed themselves and their families.
But is there a better way to make makeup? A small number of companies are producing sustainable palm oil. Emmy visits the Kumbango Plantation in West New Britain, where the owners work to ensure a safe working environment for their workers, and support for their families.
Twenty percent of palm oil is sustainable, but many brands don’t even want the name on packaging because of the negative connotations. Emmy hears from cosmetics brand L’Oreal, who tell her that they believe sustainable palm oil is the best option for the future of cosmetics.
Will her trip make her change the way she runs her business?
Publicity contact: MA
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