Large areas of rainforest containing rare and exotic birds are allegedly being destroyed by palm oil producers

Food companies supplying British supermarkets are buying palm oil from producers accused of destroying the rainforest home of some of the world’s most beautiful birds.

Palm oil companies that supply Unilever, Nestlé, Pepsi Co, Mars, Cadbury and Procter & Gamble are involved in destroying large areas of the rainforest on Papua — the Indonesian part of New Guinea that is home to Blyth’s hornbill and dozens of species of birds of paradise — to create new plantations, Greenpeace reported.

ANJ and other palm-oil companies have cleared 200 square miles on the island since the end of 2015, it said.

New Guinea has a variety of wildlife that is almost unequalled and had been relatively untouched by the palm-oil industry.

Ding Li Yong, policy manager of