Palm oil is an edible vegetable oil derived from the mesocarp of the fruit of the oil palms the African oil palm Elaeis guineensis, to a lesser extent from the American oil palm Elaeis oleifera and the maripa palm Attalea maripa. The use of palm oil in food products has attracted the concern of environmental activist groups; this has resulted in significant acreage losses of the natural habitat of the three surviving species of orangutan. One species in particular, the Sumatran orangutan, has been listed as critically endangered. Humans used oil palms as far as 5,000 years back. In the late-1800s, archaeologists discovered a substance that they concluded was palm oil in a tomb at Abydos dating back to 3,000 BCE, it is believed. Palm oil from E. guineensiss has long been recognized in West and Central African countries, is used as a cooking oil. European merchants trading with West Africa purchased palm oil for use as a cooking oil in Europe. Palm oil became a sought-after commodity by British traders, for use as an industrial lubricant for machinery during Britain's Industrial Revolution.

Palm oil formed the basis of soap products, such as Lever Brothers' "Sunlight" soap, the American Palmolive brand. By around 1870, palm oil constituted the primary export of some West African countries, although this was overtaken by cocoa in the 1880s with the introduction of colonial European cocoa plantations. Palm oil, like all fats, is composed of fatty acids, esterified with glycerol. Palm oil has an high concentration of saturated fat the 16-carbon saturated fatty acid, palmitic acid, to which it gives its name. Monounsaturated oleic acid is a major constituent of palm oil. Unrefined palm oil is a significant source of part of the vitamin E family; the approximate concentration of esterified fatty acids in palm oil is: Red palm oil is rich in carotenes, such as alpha-carotene, beta-carotene and lycopene, which give it a characteristic dark red color. However, palm oil, refined and deodorized from crude palm oil does not contain carotenes. Palm oil is reddish in color because of a high beta-carotene content.

It is not to be confused with palm kernel oil derived from the kernel of the same fruit or coconut oil derived from the kernel of the coconut palm. The differences are in color, in saturated fat content: palm mesocarp oil is 49% saturated, while palm kernel oil and coconut oil are 81% and 86% saturated fats, respectively. However, crude red palm oil, refined and deodorized, a common commodity called RBD palm oil, does not contain carotenoids. Many industrial food applications of palm oil use fractionated components of palm oil whose saturation levels can reach 90%; the oil palm produces bunches containing many fruits with the fleshy mesocarp enclosing a kernel, covered by a hard shell. The FAO considers palm palm kernels to be primary products; the oil extraction rate from a bunch varies from 17 to 27% for palm oil, from 4 to 10% for palm kernels. Along with coconut oil, palm oil is one of the few saturated vegetable fats and is semisolid at room temperature. Palm oil is a common cooking ingredient in the tropical belt of Africa, Southeast Asia and parts of Brazil.

Its use in the commercial food industry in other parts of the world is widespread because of its lower cost and the high oxidative stability of the refined product when used for frying. One source reported that humans consumed an average 17 pounds of palm oil per person in 2015. Many processed foods either contain. After milling, various palm oil products are made using refining processes. First is fractionation, with crystallization and separation processes to obtain solid, liquid fractions. Melting and degumming removes impurities; the oil is filtered and bleached. Physical refining removes smells and coloration to produce "refined and deodorized palm oil" and free fatty acids, which are used in the manufacture of soaps, washing powder and other products. RBDPO is the basic palm oil product sold on the world's commodity markets. Many companies fractionate it further to produce palm oil for cooking oil, or process it into other products. Since the mid-1990s, red palm oil has been cold-pressed from the fruit of the oil palm and bottled for use as a cooking oil, in addition to other uses such as being blended into mayonnaise and vegetable oil.

Oil produced from palm fruit is called red palm oil or just palm oil. It is around 50% saturated fat—considerably less than palm kernel oil—and 40% unsaturated fat and 10% polyunsaturated fat. In its unprocessed state, red palm oil has an intense deep red color because of its abundant carotene content. Like palm kernel oil, red palm oil contains around 50% medium chain fatty acids, but it contains the following nutrients: Carotenoids, such as alpha-carotene, beta-carotene, lycopene Sterols Vitamin E White palm oil is the result of processing and refining; when refined, the palm oil loses its deep red color. It is extensively used in food manufacture and can be found in a variety of processed foods including peanut butter and chips, it is labeled as palm shortening

Sine-Saloum is a region in Senegal located north of the Gambia and south of the Petite Côte. It encompasses an area of 24,000 square kilometers, about 12% of Senegal, with a population in the 1990s of 1,060,000; the western portion contains the Saloum Delta, a river delta at the junction of the Saloum and the North Atlantic. It is in this region. 145,811 hectares of the Delta were designated a UNESCO Heritage Site in 2011. Because it flows so this delta allows saltwater to travel deep inland. Long ago, the Serer kingdoms of Sine and Saloum were rivals. In 1984, the area was divided into two administrative regions: Fatick. Primary economic activities in the 2000's consisted of fishing, salt production, peanut farming, millet farming. Transportation is difficult because of the many islands. A secondary economy is the construction of fishing boats. Much of the region consists of mangrove swamps; the upper reaches of the rivers are affected by its desertification. The salinity of the water increased during the 1970s instance of the Sahel drought and mismanagement of the rivers upstream has been described as a factor.

Mangroves are disappearing, freshwater fish are disappearing with them. The villagers have difficulty obtaining freshwater. Sometimes water pumps are donated by international organizations, but spare parts are difficult to find when the pumps fail; the change in water salinity is affecting the ecosystem as much as it is changing the lifestyle of the inhabitants of the region. Sine-Saloum has long been feared by Europe's most distinguished mariners because the sandbanks move in Sangomar; this danger to outsiders preserved its individual villages. Labour Party of Sine Saloum Tourism in Senegal M. Klein. Islam and Imperialism in Senegal. Sine-Saloum, 1847-1914. Stanford: Stanford University Press. P. 285. Mohamed Mbodj. Un exemple d’économie coloniale, le Sine-Saloum, de 1887 à 1940. Cultures arachidières. 2. Paris: Université de Paris VII. Frans J. Schepers. Oiseaux d'eau dans le Delta du Sine-Saloum et la Sénégal. Dakar: WIWO. p. 240. Sine-Saloum at Au-Senegal.com Sine-Saloum at Senegalaisement.com

The Landesliga Lüneburg, called the Bezirksoberliga Lüneburg from 1979 to 1994 and 2006 to 2010, is the sixth tier of the German football league system and the second highest league in the German state of Lower Saxony. It covers the region of the now defunct Regierungsbezirk Lüneburg, it is one of four leagues at this level in Lower Saxony, the other three being the Landesliga Braunschweig, the Landesliga Weser-Ems and the Landesliga Hannover. The term Landesliga can be translated as State league; the league's history goes back to 1979, when four new Bezirksoberligas were formed in the state of Lower Saxony. The Bezirksoberligas were set below the Verbandsliga Niedersachsen and the two Landesligas in the German football league system. In 1994, the two old Landesligas were dissolved, while the four Bezirksoberligas were renamed into Landesliga Braunschweig, Landesliga Hannover, Landesliga Lüneburg, Landesliga Weser-Ems respectively. Due to the introduction of the new Regionalliga the new Landesligas still remained at the 6th tier of German football, however.

In 2006, the Landesliga was renamed into Bezirksoberliga again. The new Bezirksoberliga Lüneburg was made up of seventeen clubs, one from the Verbandsliga Niedersachsen-Ost, eleven from the Landesliga and five from the two Bezirksligas; the league was formed in a reorganisation of the league system in Lower Saxony, whereby the four regional Landsligas were replaced by the Bezirksoberligas. Below these, the number of Bezirksligas was increased. In Lüneburg, the two Bezirksligas were expanded to four, as in the other regions, except Weser-Ems, expanded to five; the Bezirksoberliga, like the Landesliga before, was set in the league system below the Verbandsliga and above the now four Bezirksligas, which were numbered from one to four. The winner of the Bezirksoberliga was directly promoted to the Verbandsliga, while the bottom placed teams, in a varying number, were relegated to the Bezirksliga; the Bezirksoberligas of Weser-Ems and Hanover form the tier below the Verbandsliga West, while those of Lüneburg and Braunschweig form the tier below the eastern division of the Verbandsliga.

In the leagues first season, 2006–07, the runners-up of the league, Rot-Weiß Cuxhaven, was promoted, like the runners-up from Braunschweig. In the following season, only the league champions were promoted while, in 2009, the Rot-Weiß Cuxhaven moved up a level as runners-up once more. At the end of the 2007-08 season, with the introduction of the 3. Liga, the Verbandsliga was renamed Oberliga Niedersachsen-Ost. For the Bezirksoberliga, this had no direct consequences. After the 2009-10 season, the two Oberligas in Lower Saxony were merged to one single division; the four Bezirksoberliga champions that season were not be automatically promoted, instead they had to compete with the four teams placed ninth and tenth in the Oberliga for four more spots in this league. On 17 May 2010, the Lower Saxony football association decided to rename the four Bezirksoberligas to Landesligas from 1 July 2010; this change in name came alongside the merger of the two Oberliga divisions above it into the Niedersachsenliga.

Promoted teams in bold. Deutschlands Fußball in Zahlen, An annual publication with tables and results from the Bundesliga to Verbandsliga/Landesliga, publisher: DSFS Kicker Almanach, The yearbook on German football from Bundesliga to Oberliga, since 1937, published by Kicker Sports Magazine Die Deutsche Liga-Chronik 1945-2005 History of German football from 1945 to 2005 in tables, publisher: DSFS, published: 2006 Das deutsche Fussball Archiv Historic German league tables The Lower Saxony Football Association