Exclusive: The Dark Side of Nutella

For millions of people around the world, Nutella is more than just a spread – it’s a morning ritual. But behind that smooth, chocolatey texture lies an ingredient that has fuelled a years-long controversy: palm oil.

Once largely overlooked by consumers, palm oil became the subject of serious scientific scrutiny, environmental campaigns, and even a full-blown “jar war” between two Italian food giants.

Here’s what we know today – and why the story is more nuanced than the headlines suggest.

What Sparked the Controversy

The debate around palm oil in Nutella gained global momentum back in 2016, when the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) published a landmark report on process contaminants in vegetable oils. The findings were unsettling: when palm oil is refined at temperatures above 200°C, it produces substances called glycidyl fatty acid esters (GEs) – compounds that break down in the body into glycidol, a substance EFSA classified as both carcinogenic and mutagenic.

The report was careful, however, not to recommend that consumers stop eating palm oil products altogether. Instead, EFSA stated that exposure to these contaminants was “a concern for all age groups” and called for further research to better understand the level of risk from typical dietary intake.

Crucially, no large-scale human study has since directly linked normal consumption of palm oil to an increased rate of cancer. The risk, scientists agree, is tied to the processing method – specifically the refining temperature – rather than to palm oil as such.

Ferrero, the Italian company behind Nutella, responded quickly. The company confirmed that it processes its palm oil below the critical temperature threshold identified by EFSA and has since become one of the most transparent actors in the palm oil industry.

Palm Oil and the Environment: A Bigger Problem Than Health

While the health debate has its nuances, the environmental case against unsustainable palm oil is harder to dismiss. Palm oil cultivation has been one of the leading drivers of deforestation in Southeast Asia – between 2001 and 2016, oil palm plantations accounted for nearly a quarter of all deforestation in Indonesia.

The destruction of rainforest habitat has pushed species such as orangutans, Sumatran tigers, and pygmy elephants closer to extinction, while also releasing vast quantities of carbon stored in peatlands, accelerating climate change.

That said, palm oil is also an extraordinarily efficient crop. It produces more oil per hectare of land than any other vegetable oil, meaning that replacing it with alternatives like sunflower or rapeseed oil would require significantly more farmland – a trade-off that environmentalists have widely acknowledged. The real issue is not palm oil itself, but the conditions under which it is grown.

Ferrero’s Response: From Controversy to Industry Leader

Facing mounting pressure, Ferrero did not try to quietly reformulate Nutella. Instead, it doubled down on making its palm oil supply chain the most transparent in the industry.

Since January 2015, Nutella has been produced exclusively using 100% RSPO-certified segregated palm oil – meaning the sustainable oil is kept physically separate from non-certified sources at every point in the supply chain, from plantation to factory.

Ferrero publishes traceability data every six months, monitoring over 1.6 million hectares of sourcing areas via satellite to ensure a deforestation-free supply chain.

The results have been recognised externally: in the 2024 WWF Palm Oil Buyers Scorecard, which evaluates 285 global companies on their sustainable palm oil practices, Ferrero ranked second – scoring 22.9 out of 24. That places it ahead of the vast majority of the food industry.

Enter Barilla: The Rival Spread That Changed the Market

While Ferrero was working to clean up its supply chain, Italian pasta giant Barilla took a different approach: it decided to offer consumers a palm-oil-free alternative entirely.

In January 2019, Barilla launched Crema Pan di Stelle on the Italian market – a hazelnut chocolate spread made with sunflower oil, Italian-grown hazelnuts, and sustainably harvested cocoa, with bits of Pan di Stelle cookies mixed in for a distinctive crunch. The spread was positioned not as a Nutella clone but as a better-for-you option for consumers who had grown wary of palm oil.

The response was remarkable. Within its first year, Crema Pan di Stelle helped grow the entire chocolate spread category in Italy by 11% in value. By 2019, the wider Pan di Stelle product range – which includes biscuits, cakes, and breakfast cereals – posted annual turnover of over €100 million, up 50% compared to 2018.

Industry analysts noted at the time that while the spread enjoyed significant brand recognition among Italian consumers, international expansion would be a tougher challenge. Barilla is known globally for pasta, and persuading foreign markets to see it as a confectionery brand remains an uphill battle. Nevertheless, Crema Pan di Stelle has maintained its position as the most prominent palm-oil-free challenger in the spreadable chocolate category.

So Should You Be Worried About Nutella?

For those who remain uncomfortable with the ingredient, regardless of how it is sourced, options like Crema Pan di Stelle demonstrate that palm-oil-free alternatives are viable, commercially successful, and increasingly easy to find.

What the Nutella controversy ultimately achieved was something the food industry rarely accomplishes voluntarily: it forced one of its most powerful players to become one of its most accountable ones, and it pushed a competitor to rethink a product category altogether. Whether that counts as a “dark side” or a turning point is, perhaps, a matter of perspective.

Sources: European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), 2016 – Process contaminants in vegetable oils and foods; WWF Palm Oil Buyers Scorecard 2024; Ferrero Group Sustainability Reports; Barilla Group press releases.