Development Matters: Health and Sustainability of Palm Oil

Palm oil is almost ubiquitous in our food. But what is it doing to our health and the economies & environment where it is produced? An international collaboration, part of the Leverhulme Centre for Integrative Research in Agriculture and Health (LCIRAH), has recently been awarded funding from the grant from the Wellcome Trust to co-lead a pilot research project on health and sustainability aspects of palm oil. The research project ‘POSHE: Palm Oil: Sustainability, Health and Economics’ started last September and is co-led. Anna Marry from London International Development Centre (LICD) speaks to Bhavani Shankar, Professor of International Food, Agriculture and Health at SOAS and Richard Smith, Professor of Health System Economics at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.