Ojon palm nut oil
The Ojon ® Corporation, a Canadian beauty care company within the Estée Lauder Companies, has teamed up with the Rainforest Alliance in order to ensure that the company's use of rare palm nut oil from Honduran rainforests is sustainable and locally beneficial.
Oil from the nuts of Ojon palm trees is used in hair care products. The special property of the oil - making hair shine - has long been well-known by the indigenous Tawira, who are also known as "the people of beautiful hair".
Local community development
Together with MOPAWI, a nonprofit organization supporting communities in The Mosquitia region of northeastern Honduras, the Rainforest Alliance will help the Tawira and other indigenous groups to improve the productivity and sustainability of the ojon, as well as other non-timber forest products such as cocoa and swa oil.
“With MOPAWI and local communities, we are developing new approaches to improving livelihoods and promoting conservation in this region that are consistent with traditional customs and knowledge, that is based on sustainability and that will benefit the people of this region and provide them with the incentive to protect their forest resources and culture,” said the Rainforest Alliance’s Greg Minnick, who is overseeing the project.
The Tawira live not far from the Río Plátano Biosphere Reserve, where the Rainforest Alliance currently assists twelve communities in business development based on forestry that promotes long-term conservation of the region’s globally significant biodiversity - including jaguars, white-lipped peccaries, Baird’s tapirs, white-faced capuchin monkeys and hundreds of bird species.
Source: Rainforest Alliance
