At this time in Australia and New Zealand, labelling palm oil on food products is not a requirement. It will appear on labels as "vegetable oil" in food items and Elaeis guineensis in cosmetic items.

The problem with palm oil is that forests are being destroyed to make way for palm plantations. This practice destroys the natural habitat of the endangered Orang-utan.

Please watch the video and sign the Zoos Victoria petition calling for palm oil labelling to be included in the nutritional information chart on food products.

Don't Palm Us Off from Zoos Victoria on Vimeo.

How to identify palm oil in products: Shopping Guide

Resources and more information on palm oil:

• Palm Oil Facts
• Palm Oil Action Brochure (PDF)
• Palm Oil Action
• Australian Orangutan Project

technorati tags: palm oil orangutan habitat, palm oil orangutan, palm oil, orang-utan, orangutan,rainforest, habitat, food label, palm

I was making myself a sprouted spelt toastie with fetta and avocado. I never thought I'd actually admit to eating that. Anyway, I had just read an article describing how it is a good idea to spear an avocado in the pip and twist it out.

What the article should have also mentioned is to put the avocado on a flat surface, not to hold it in your hand. But the writer didn't count on someone like me reading his article and doing something quite so spectacularly stupid.

Half an avocado in my left hand, a knife in my right, I had speared the pip to a certain extent but I needed to push harder. So of course I pushed harder.

Without warning the knife slipped off the pip, the pip went flying over my head, the knife shot through the outside of the avocado and stabbed straight into the base of my second finger. It stopped suddenly, perhaps because it hit the bone. I pulled the knife firstly out of my finger and then out of the avocado.

I calmly held my finger without looking as a few thoughts coalesced in my mind:

"Wow. This is going to hurt."
"I'm not sure I'm quite ready to look at it yet."
"Damn, I've got to stop making my sandwich, I'm so hungry."

I got a tissue, wrapped it around the base of my finger without a sound or a word. I walked out and casually said to my partner.

"Ah. Just stabbed my finger."
He looked concerned but I told him it was ok.

I finally looked at it - the shallow part of the cut was about a centimetre and the deep part is about half the size. The cut was shallow on the edges and deep in the middle. It also had a gross bit sticking out of it. It wasn't really that bad, it was just a surprise. One minute you're making a feta and avocado toastie, the next: "surprise"!! You've got a knife is sticking out of your finger.

Here's the weird thing though, it didn't really hurt, just a dull sting. I followed my somewhat modified version of:

Rest
Ice
Compression
Elevation


It went something like:

Squeeze tissue around finger
Elevation
Finish making toastie
Nip of cider


My finger is looking much better now and I have resolved in future to remove avocado pips by cutting around the pip and flicking it out.

Its safer that way.

technorati tags: avocado, accident, knife, finger, stupid

Let's face it. Social networking is taking over the world. People seem to love the format, the feel, the connection with other people. Unfortunately, many online shopping sites are going to start looking like dinosaurs as technology moves faster than the people who run the sites.

Thankfully, there are a few sites that are stepping up to the online shopping/social networking fusion. I like to call it Shopping 2.0!

One of these notable sites is Canadian deal hunting site, Wishabi.ca


















The design is cute, the interface is friendly, and you can even sign in with Facebook. Canadians who once had trouble finding products to ship to Canada from the US can now band together and feature deals specifically for those living in Canada. The site also promotes cross-border shopping in which you can find the best deals from the US and Canada and compare/rate to find the best deals. This feature also calculates the hidden fees associated with shopping across the border such as cross-border fees and exchange rates so there are no nasty surprises when it comes to checkout time.

Each merchant has a ranking determined by Wishabi members so you can research a store's performance before committing to buy. If you find a great deal, you can share it with your online shopping friends and gain points depending on the popularity of your chosen item. I did a search for "canvas messenger bag", as I am considering adding yet another bag to my growing collection. The deals were excellent. I found quite a few bags for under $40 Canadian dollars. I was able to filter the results by price, and deal rating points. Deal ratings are calculated using feedback from the Wishabi community and statistical analysis to allow users to make informed decisions on price trends and the right time to buy. Members are also rewarded in cash by finding a better deal than the current Wishabi deals. The minimum payout is $20 CAD and payment is made by PayPal. I predict that community-driven sites are the future of online shopping, with the power ultimately resting in the hands of the consumer.