Cadbury and palm oil

Consumers are lashing back against Cadbury's change to its chocolate recipe. The unannounced shift includes a switch to include palm oil in its chocolate. When confronted about the threat to the last vestiges of rainforest, home to the Orangutan in Southeast Asia, that are being cleared for palm oil, Cadbury responds: "Cadbury Australia and New Zealand can confirm that it has ensured that all the palm oil purchased for its Cadbury Dairy Milk range is certified as sustainably sourced. Cadbury is a founding member of the Roundtable of Sustainable Palm Oil(RSPO), and has been working since the RSPO's creation to develop sustainable sources of Palm Oil... As a business we only use palm oil purchased from other audited and approved members of the Roundtable of Sustainable Palm Oil." A look at the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) website (http://www.rspo.org/Criteria_for_Sustainable_Palm_Oil.aspx) shows this claim is open to dispute. The website includes these basic FAQ's: Q: Are physical audits conducted to ensure the organisation meets the minimum criteria? No. As the development of criteria for sustainable palm oil is ongoing, a physical audit is not carried out to ensure applicants meet minimum criteria. The RSPO aims to raise the "sustainability level" of the palm oil industry; hence it aims to accept a wide range of organisations as members so long as they commit to the objectives of the RSPO. A reporting mechanism is also currently being formulated to ensure all current RSPO Members are actively contributing to the growth of sustainable palm oil through the member organizations' management practices, research activities, and implementation of relevant projects. Q: Will the ultimate path of the development of criteria by RSPO for sustainable palm oil lead to a certification scheme? No. This is not currently seen as the ultimate aim, though some mechanism for verification or measurement would be needed in future. Cadbury also claims on its New Zealand website (http://www.cadbury.co.nz/About-Cadbury/Frequently-Asked-Questions.aspx) that it buys Greenpalm certified Palm Oil and gives the link to its website. On the home page (http://www.greenpalm.org/site/), one of the first things it reveals is that only RSPO certified plantations can offer GreenPalm certificates, which as RSPO admits, are not guaranteed to be sustainable at all.