Palm oil can be found in around 50 percent of consumer products, from cleaning fluids to cosmetics to snack bars to pet food. At first glance, it seems to be a great, versatile commodity, capable of being put to any number of uses – though this versatile quality has certainly been abused, as it was used in the production of toxic napalm during World War II. These days, the main problem with industrial palm oil production is the trail of environmental destruction that it leaves in its wake.

Throughout Malaysia and the Indonesian islands of Sumatra and Borneo, vast swathes of rainforest have been cleared to make way for palm plantations through methods such as “slash-and-burn.”  This causes huge problems for wildlife in these areas, as well as the health of local children and families. Sumatran rhinos, Sumatran tigers, pygmy elephants, and orangutans are just a few of the animal species now struggling to survive because of the palm oil’s demand for the space they once called home. Rampant forest fires have ensured that Indonesia ranks as one of the largest carbon polluters on the planet, in addition to holding the dubious honor of having the world’s highest rate of deforestation.

One area that has been hit particularly hard by big palm oil interests is the Leuser Ecosystem of Sumatra’s Aceh and North Sumatra provinces: described by Lindsey Allen, executive director of the Rainforest Action Network (RAN) as “one of those almost mythic natural wonders that defies the imagination with its diversity and abundance of life” and an “extraordinary landscape … the last place on earth where orangutans, tigers, rhinos and elephants still roam together.” The true scale of the deforestation problem in this ecosystem and in other areas taken over by palm oil production has been difficult to quantify … but the picture below illustrates exactly how grave it has become.