Finding foods and products that are suitable for vegans is a pretty challenging task sometimes. You’ll see coconut oil frequently recommended, but is it vegan? Is it harvested sustainably?
Coconut oil certainly is vegan, because it is purely made from coconuts. That means it’s 100 percent plant matter. It’s used in a lot of vegan recipes, and the actual product doesn’t result in any animal cruelty whatsoever. However, the harvesting methods can be controversial, because some coconut farmers use monkeys to acquire the coconuts.
In this article, we’re going to check whether coconut oil is vegan, and find out more about how this food is created. We’ll look at what you can do to make sure the foods you eat are ethical.
Is Coconut Oil Vegan?
Put simply, yes, this is a vegan product. Coconut oil is made by pressing coconut meat firmly (either the fresh or dried meat; the resulting products are similar). The pressing extracts the oil from the coconut, and it can then be collected, packaged, and sold to consumers. This makes it a fully vegan-friendly product if you just look at the product itself.
A lot of vegans eat coconut oil because it’s full of healthy fats and it can be used as a good replacement for dairy in many recipes. It’s rich and flavorful, and very enjoyable. You might be delighted to learn that it’s vegan-friendly… but there’s a little bit more to the story than that.
As with so many products, you need to go deeper if you’re truly looking to find ethical products that avoid animal cruelty. It’s surprising and saddening how many industries exploit animals in different ways, even if the final product does not contain any animal-based ingredients.
Things to be aware of when you’re choosing vegan products include:
- Habitat loss
- Chemicals in the production process
- Animal cruelty
The third one is the biggest area of concern when it comes to coconut oil.
Are The Harvesting Methods Vegan?
Although coconut oil can certainly be harvested in ways that do not involve animal cruelty, it’s important to be aware that some manufacturers use monkeys to get the coconuts off the palm trees. The monkeys are trained, from a young age, to climb the tree, collect the coconuts, and bring them back down.
Apart from being exploitative, this is also enormously cruel, as the industry tends to use baby monkeys so that they can teach them how to collect the coconuts more easily. The training methods are often harsh and involve negative coercion, and the monkeys are very young.
They are generally kept in poor conditions and are not rewarded for their work. They do not get to eat the fruits that they harvest, and they are not cared for. This sort of life is miserable for the monkey, depriving it of natural behaviors and the opportunity to socialize with its own kind.
Additionally, the mothers are often killed so that they cannot defend their babies. This leads to the slaughter of wild monkeys, as well as the theft of the babies. Some companies breed the monkeys in captivity, which may result in even more suffering. Neither option is an ethical way to go about harvesting coconuts.
To many vegans, this would make some kinds of coconut oil unsuitable for consumption. Not all coconut oil is harvested this way, but it’s extremely important to be aware of this issue and to look for brands that avoid this kind of exploitation and animal suffering if you want to eat ethical food.
Which Brands Don’t Use Monkeys For Harvesting?
Fortunately for vegans who love coconut oil, there are quite a few companies that pride themselves on ethics and do not use monkeys to harvest the coconuts.
You should look out for the following brands:
You should also look for the fair-trade logo or other certifications about sustainability and ethical practices. After all, if monkeys are not harvesting the coconuts, humans will be – and you want to know that they are also working in comfortable, good conditions.
If you want to know more about a brand, you should research the company, and consider getting in touch to learn more about their harvesting works. Companies with good ethics will be happy to inform you about how they run their businesses, so if you get evasive answers, treat the brand with caution going forward.
Conclusion
As you can see, it’s worth looking into the harvesting practices behind a kind of food before you buy it. Although there’s no such thing as an impact-free product, being informed will let you make good choices, like buying coconut oil that is harvested by humans being paid a living wage.
