A palm oil alternative could help save rainforests

There's an ugly truth to the beauty products we slap on our faces and an unsavoury truth to the foods we eat: many are made with palm oil, which is responsible for the rapid deforestation of some of the world's most biodiverse forests, destroying the habitat of already endangered species like the orangutan, pygmy elephant and Sumatran rhino.

But now the biotech industry says it has come up with a solution - a synthetic alternative that doesn't involve burning down or clearing any rainforest. It says this could eventually replace natural palm oil in everything from shampoos, soaps, detergents and lipsticks, to food products like packaged bread, biscuits, margarine, ice cream and chocolate. Continued reading