Journalist Zuckerman links the cultivation and production of palm oil to "the combined twenty-first-century crises of obesity, malnutrition, and climate change" in this sharp exposé. She details how palm oil and other natural resources spurred the scramble for Africa by European colonizers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and cites evidence that the British soap-making company Lever Brothers (now part of Unilever) used slave labor to harvest palm oil on the 1.8-million acres it controlled in the Belgian Congo. An ingredient in everything from toothpaste to nondairy creamer, palm oil now accounts for a third of the world's vegetable oil consumption. In the Brazilian state of Bahia, Zuckerman meets a chef who demonstrates how palm oil is integrated into the local cuisine. In Sumatra, she visits a conservation organization for orangutans, whose habitats are threatened by the palm oil industry's deforestation practices. Zuckerman also documents how plantation workers in Honduras are subjected to hazardous chemicals for appallingly low wages. Vividly describing people and places damaged by the palm oil industry, Zuckerman establishes a through line connecting 19th-century imperialism to the exploitative practices of today's multinational corporations. This deeply reported account sounds the alarm loud and clear. (May)

A wide-angle study of the global scourge of palm oil production. In the last decade, palm oil, once just an innocuous ingredient in dishwashing liquid, has become an increasingly ubiquitous global commodity, finding its way into everything from bread and chocolate to makeup and margarine. After years of globe-trotting reportage on the environmental and health hazards of this deceptively sinister substance, journalist Zuckerman--former deputy editor of Gourmet, articles editor of OnEarth, and executive editor of Modern Farmer--offers this definitive, damning account of the history of palm oil production and the ecological destruction it causes. "Following the plant's journey over the decades," she writes, "has served as a sort of master class in everything from colonialism and commodity fetishism to globalization and the industrialization of our modern food system." The first half of the book covers the trade's colonial beginnings, with "men of empire" like British imperialists George Goldie and William Lever marching arrogantly into Africa in the 19th century and monopolizing the palm oil business. Both exploited African labor while pushing the Indigenous trade out of their own markets. The second half of the book is where the prescient core of Zuckerman's exposé lies, as she recounts a disturbing litany of contemporary ills associated with the palm oil trade. The author is unsparing in her revelations, from the ecological damage to the adverse health effects of palm oil and its use in cheap, high-calorie foods. "It's common to blame sugar for the world's weight problems, but in the last half-century, refined vegetable oils have added far more calories to the global diet than has any other food group," she writes. But the book is not entirely grim: Zuckerman offers practical suggestions for proactively weaning ourselves off of palm oil--e.g., using synthetic versions of the oil and convincing companies to adopt no-deforestation policies in their production codes. Instructive and provocative without the dour preachiness of so many eco-activist books. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Palm oil. It's in everything, from candles to crackers, lipstick to potato chips, in America and even more dominantly in other countries, such as India, which has become the world's largest importer. How did a product that few consumers know they're using become so ubiquitous? Award-winning journalist Zuckerman illuminates the evolution of the global palm oil industry and how the cultivation of the oil palm tree has had a catastrophic impact on the Third World temperate zones in which it thrives. Tracing the historical roots of the oil palm's genesis as a food source for native populations to its key role in industries as disparate as biofuels and cosmetics, Zuckerman reveals how thousands of workers have suffered horrific human rights abuses and the corresponding ecological destruction in some of the planet's most fragile environments. Crisscrossing four continents, Zuckerman presents a spirited and disarming exposé of the insidious way this one tree species has endangered cultures, economies, and ecosystems. Along with hair-raising accounts of endemic torture, deceit, and corruption, Zuckerman also catalogs grassroots and governmental efforts to stem the use of palm oil-laden products. "Pay attention to palm oil," Zuckerman nearly shouts in this crucial and exemplary work of investigative planetary journalism.