Did a Monkey Pick Your Coconuts?
An Animal Rights Article from All-Creatures.org

FROM

Animal Place Sanctuary
September 2015

[Also read Did an Abused Monkey Pick Your Coconut? February 2015]

In an effort to help compassionate consumers make informed choices, Animal Place reached out to a number of companies that sell coconut oil or other products containing coconuts.

slave monkeys pick coconuts
Macaque helping trainer collect fallen coconuts, Surat Thani, Thailand
Photo by Michael Freeman

In some regions of the world, pig-tailed macaques are intentionally bred and trained – often with punishment – to harvest coconuts. The monkeys are always tethered to their “handler” and are not permitted to eat the coconuts they collect.

No statistics exist detailing exactly how many monkeys are bred and used for this purpose. In an effort to help compassionate consumers make informed choices, Animal Place reached out to a number of companies that sell coconut oil or other products containing coconuts. This is not an exhaustive list and you can reach out to a company yourself and let us know if they respond.

Our Approved! list includes companies that do not use monkeys and, also important, that engage in practices protecting the rights of human workers as well (e.g. fair trade, no child labor.) We will add to this list as we learn more information.

As of September 2015:

APPROVED! Companies That DO NOT Use Monkeys AND are Fair-Trade
These companies engage in ethical business practices, ensuring human workers are properly compensated for their work. They do not use monkeys or human children to harvest coconuts.

  • Dr. Bronner’s
  • Earth Circle Organics
  • Harmless Harvest
  • Maison Orphee
  • Naked Coconuts
  • Nutiva
  • So Delicious

Companies that responded but not clarify whether monkeys were used:

  • Taste the Dream (Hain-Celestial) – stated that their products are fair-trade but did not clarify that only adult humans harvested coconuts.

Companies that have not responded yet:

  • Nature Pacific Limited (Queensland)
  • Nature’s Way
  • Silk
  • Thai Kitchen
  • Trader Joe’s
  • Trident (Australia)

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