Kalimantan, Indonesia (CNN) — Deep within the jungles of Indonesian Borneo, illegal fires rage, creating apocalyptic red skies and smoke that has spread as far as Malaysia and Singapore.
People are choking. Animals are dying.
This is no ordinary fire. It was lit for you.
Farmers are clearing land the fastest way they know how to cash in on growing demand for palm oil, which is used in half of all supermarket products, from chocolate to shampoo.
They’re not only burning the forest, they’re destroying the peatlands that lie beneath it — the world’s largest natural terrestrial carbon sink.
Fire data by NASA FIRMS, NRT VIIRS 375m Active Fire product, for all of September 2019. Map credit: Maps4news.com/©HERE
Experts say the annual infernos have ignited a climate bomb with disastrous consequences for the world in…
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Exposing the Big Game 
The majority of palm oil is used in junk food – candies, cookies, crackers – which makes it especially sad to see forests disappear for nothing. I think it is a cheaper fat to use. I avoid it like the plague, although it is getting more difficult to do. A lot of products have recently changed their formulations to include palm oil (Ritz crackers, we’re looking at you!). For now, Keebler Townhouse does not use it, and Pepperidge Farm sometimes does and sometimes doesn’t. I haven’t eaten a Girl Scout cookie in years.
Keep it up!