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Definition of oil palm
: an African pinnate-leaved palm (Elaeis guineensis) cultivated for its clustered fruit whose flesh and seeds yield oil
Examples of oil palm in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web Land has been appropriated in Southeast Asia and Brazil to expand oil palm production and in parts of Africa to produce plantation crops such as cacao.
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Eric Toensmeier, Scientific American, "How Climate Change Strategies That Use Biomass Can Be More Realistic," 1 Aug. 2020 The rest live in the southern states of peninsular Malaysia, where forests are quickly being converted to oil palm plantations.
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Rachel Nuwer, National Geographic, "New monkey species found hiding in plain sight," 22 June 2020 The expansion of oil palm plantations was the primary driver behind a nearly 20 percent loss in Sumatran tiger habitat between 2000 and 2012, one study found.
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National Geographic, "Sumatran tiger," 24 Mar. 2020 Johnson wants to tell the world about wild oil palm and alternative production models.
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Emma Reynolds, CNN, "Palm oil that doesn't destroy forests? One entrepreneur thinks he has the answer," 26 Nov. 2019 But in the 1980s, concession holders started to dig drainage canals through peatlands to float out logs and dry out the peat to plant dryland crops, especially oil palm and acacia trees for pulp and paper.
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Dennis Normile, Science | AAAS, "Indonesia's fires are bad, but new measures prevented them from becoming worse," 1 Oct. 2019 Palm oil is a controversial cooking oil, as global demand is causing producers in Africa to clear large areas of tropical forests to make room for oil palm plantations.
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Ian Burke, Saveur, "The Complete Guide to Cooking Oils," 10 Oct. 2018 But Roucoux worries that someday oil palm harvesters or other farmers will target the area for development.
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Daniel Grossman, Scientific American, "Peru’s Peatlands Could Greatly Accelerate Global Warming," 5 Feb. 2020 Since the oil palm yields four to ten times more vegetable oil per hectare than any other crop, there is no obvious alternative, according to The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
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Emma Reynolds, CNN, "Palm oil that doesn't destroy forests? One entrepreneur thinks he has the answer," 26 Nov. 2019
See MoreThese example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'oil palm.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
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Time Traveler for oil palm
The first known use of oil palm was in 1850
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