Clean and palm oil-free living.

Never one to shy from a challenge, commencing with soap and cleaning products seemed like a sensible choice - not least due to the lack of body wash and laundry detergent in the household.

A trip to my local supermarket of choice (a locally-owned Foodland, rather than corporation owned Woolworths or Coles) was both productive and frustrating:

1. Laundry detergent: surprisingly easy. For a product that is not eaten, labelling on laundry detergents surprised me, as ingredients are clearly listed. Of course, as is usually the case for palm oil-derived ingredients, deciphering names was going to be necessary.

Or so I thought: third item I picked up, Aware Eco Choice, prominently states on the front of the packaging that it does not contain palm oil:

A visit to the product's FAQ makes it even clearer:

Do the powders use any PALM OIL derived ingredients?
No - we are happy to announce, that we now source the primary Surfactant (detergent agent) used in the Aware laundry powders from coconut oil. While Aware Environmental Ltd (Orange Power and Aware’s parent company) and Planet Ark currently support the intentions of the ‘Round Table on Sustainable Palm Oil’ (visit www.rspo.org for more info) it is our opinion that the production of palm oil will never be sustainable. Should large international companies, who chair the RSPO, demonstrate the responsible sourcing of palm oil in the future, it will not work to decrease the total demand for the product. Even if a sustainable palm oil product was developed the demand for it would continue to grow and place additional pressure on forests in Indonesia and Malaysia, not to mention new supply countries like Columbia. Coconut Oil is a sound alternative to use as a base for surfactants as it does not represent the same immediate and critical threat to rainforest habitats.

In contrast, other laundry products that claim to be good for the environment use palm oil-derived ingredients and are therefore very bad for the environment. Avoid them at all cost.

2. Body wash/soap: not a single product. Every single item contained palm oil. I am clearly not going to be able to purchase soap at a supermarket. This is going to require some more research.