With many of these benefits, oil palm (an agricultural crop) has been also playing a major role in giving rise to three important sources of food including palm oil, palm kernel oil, and Palm Kernel Cake. The first two products are edible and are used as cooking oil, bakery fats, ice creams, Vitamin E, and palm kernel cake is used as an animal feed.

Owing to the high land productivity of palm oil, it produces 0.42, 0.59, and 0.36 tonnes of oil per hectare for sunflower, rapeseed and soyabeen respectively. If palm oil is used as a substitute to rapeseed, it needs to be highlighted that seven times less land will be used in the production. Sparing hectares of land, it allows the farmers to grow other fruits, vegetables and food grains.

Cosmetics, soaps, toothpaste, lubricants and ink- all constitute palm oil in form or the other. Moreover, it also aids in preventing Vitamin A deficiency, brain diseases, aging, and cancer. Malaria, high cholesterol, cyanide poisoning are some of its other benefits. And yes ladies, if you are trying hard to lose those extra inches, palm oil can be the best escape as it enhances your metabolism.

With acres of rainforest being cut down, there is a risk to the habitat of several endangered species. Climate change is another consequence arising due to the conversion of a rainforest into plantations.

But the list of benefits this incredibly efficient crop- oil palm has to offer, cannot be denied.