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Health Hazard of Palm Oil These foods contain cheap fat
More and more industrially produced products of the food companies contain palm oil. The low-fat is classified as hazardous to health and ecologically harmful. For the industry, however, the use of fat is mainly money-saving. Victims are the people in the countries where it is produced and in this country those who eat it and may die sooner.
Many foods apparently contain cheap fat. This is shown by an analysis of the guide portal "Codecheck", which was recently published in Berlin. As reported by the news agency "dpa-AFX", the auditors had taken more than 115,000 food closer look and recognized that, for example, the number of products with palm oil has increased significantly since the beginning of the survey.
This is included in Nutella. Source: Consumer Center Experts have been warning of the health risks of palm oil for some time now
According to the analysis of the consumer portal revealed that since the survey began in late 2012, the number of food with palm oil has increased on average by 6.5 percent. In exceptional cases, such as nut and chocolate creams even increased by 26 percent. Ferrero's world-famous nut-nougat cream "Nutella" plays a key role in this, which consists of 20 percent palm oil per glass.
Already weeks ago, experts in the ZDF business magazine "Wiso" had warned against the health risks of vegetable fat, which is extracted from the fruits and kernels of the oil palm.
During the industrial processing of palm fat, dangerous pollutants (fatty acid esters) are produced during the course of intense heating, which even in small quantities can lead to considerable damage to health and are considered carcinogenic.
Risk factor for serious diseases
Michael Roden of the German Diabetes Center told the Huffington Post: "The problem with palm oil is its saturated fat content." These lead to the deterioration of blood lipids, which ultimately increases the risk of diabetes. But that's not all: According to Roden, damage to the vascular wall and so-called oxidative stress "can lead to vascular calcification being favored and is a risk factor for heart attacks, strokes and even death". In addition to Nutella, "Wiso" has tested six other nut nougat creams and found that they all contain the dangerous pollutants. The best values are Nutella and the cheap version Nulacta from Norma. Almost seven times as high Nusskati is burdened by Aldi Nord. Aldi Nord has reported lower levels in its own samples.
Deforestation of rainforests
In addition to the health effects, there is another negative side effect: For the production of palm oil, especially in Indonesia massive rainforests are cut down to make enough space for production. Around 70 percent of the world's palm oil is now in our food. Susanne Umbach from the consumer center Rhineland-Palatinate told the "Huffington Post" why this is so: "The oil is cheap for the industry, the plantations are very productive." Nutella manufacturer Ferrero himself states, no palm oil from the Southeast Asian country, but to use only sustainably produced palm oil. French Environment Minister Ségolène Royal called for a boycott of Nutella just a few months ago. "You have to stop eating Nutella," the minister said at the time. The socialist also criticized that forest areas would be cleared for the palm oil contained therein. (No)