Your Connection to the Amazon

Take a glance around your kitchen.

Everyday ingredients can come from near and far, and chances are some of your grocery buys came from the Amazon rainforest.

The Amazon rainforest has this mystical reputation for being the lungs of the planet. A rep earned from being a massive forest covering multiple countries. It is truly insane how ginormous the Amazon rainforest is…

With this vastness of biodiversity, it’s understandable that the Amazon rainforest has become an indispensable resource for the world for everything from coffee to shampoo.

Some things on the list may surprise you.

Food Coloring

Thanks to a spice called ‘Achiote’, the Amazon rainforest has been a go-to for adding yellow hues to commercial foods such as cheeses, butter and margarine and smoked fish. Achiote has a mild earthy/peppery flavor that makes it a common ingredient in Caribbean and Mexican meals too.

Black Pepper

Granted, Vietnam produces more black pepper than anyone else, but the Brazilian Amazon rainforest still gets to be on this list as it produces roughly 40,000 tons of black pepper per year. A sum that 85% of the world gets to take part in on the market.

Palm Oil

Heads up: this is a point of the list that isn’t great for the natural environment.

Palm oil is a key component of many foods and cosmetic products, and it has been a point of profit for those in the industry. So much so that some politicians want to make Brazil the global leader in palm oil. Unfortunately, that would come at the cost of handing over parts of the Amazon rainforest to palm oil producers. Needless to say, this will and has had a substantial climate impact.

Golf Balls

We had to have the final list item be a curveball. Though manufacturers today no longer produce or sell golf balls with balata covers, some still exist in the circulation of the golf community, especially on eBay. Up until the 90s, golf balls were covered in balata which is a naturally occurring tree sap that hardens into a rubber-like texture. To use a balata golf ball was a staple of being a pro golfer as balata balls had a softness to them making it easy for an inexperienced golfer to nick and scratch them.

Though a large part of the Amazon the forest floor is almost completely black, as only 1% of sunlight can make it through the thick canopy (it takes around 10 minutes for the water to seep down to the shrubbery below) the Amazon rainforest manages to be a powerhouse for resources worldwide.

But with these ongoing productions of the Amazon rainforest providing core ingredients to the world, it is important to be aware of how to conserve such a superstar resource that is also at the heart of many Indigenous communities.

How to support the Amazon rainforest:

With these products traveling from the Amazon, it means we have the power to buy responsibly and check that your products have been created sustainably.
To make helping the Amazon even simpler we can limit our use of fossil fuels to lessen the impact of climate change on the Amazon rainforest. Riding a bike, busing or carpooling are great methods to minimize our carbon footprint.
Even easier than that is to voice your concern and awareness for the well-being of the Amazon. As the Amazon rainforest is far away from most, it's important to keep in mind how our actions influence its health and longevity.

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