The palm oil scandal: Boots and Waitrose named and shamed: retailers complicit in environmental damage caused by industry, World Wide Fund for Nature says Most British manufacturers and retailers, including Boots, Morrisons, and Waitrose, have done little to limit the environmental damage done by the production of the world's cheapest vegetable oil, according to research published on 28 Oct 2009. In a survey of leading European food and household firms, the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) said that only Sainsbury's, Marks and Spencer, and a handful of other companies had made substantial progress towards sourcing sustainable palm oil. Continental retailers came out worst in the survey of 59 firms, with many French, German, and Dutch chains making no effort to prevent the huge problems caused by the oil's production. The WWF disclosed that 40 of the 59 companies had not bought any oil certified sustainable by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (Rspo), which sets environmental standards for the ยฃ16 bn/y industry, the most important of which is a ban on planting new oil palms in virgin forests. The WWF believes palm oil will grow in importance in coming years, because production is forecast to rise by up to 10%/y and the only place palm oil can be grown is in the tropics, home to the world's great rainforests.