NPR.

This is the indicator from Planet Money, I'm Whalen Wong.

And I'm Paddy Hirsch.

Mention rising oil prices and people usually think about fuel oil in the cost of heating

oil and gasoline.

But there's another kind of oil that's seen some dramatic spikes in price recently,

cooking oil.

Soybean, rapeseed, sunflower, the supply of all of these oils has been disrupted in the

last year, by drought in the case of soy and rapeseed and in the case of sunflower oil

by the war in Ukraine.

Parm oil has also seen a price spike, rising more than 50% on global commodity markets

since October of last year.

Parm oil is the cheapest and most used cooking oil in the world, and its increased cost

is making huge waves.

It's contributing to a surge in food prices that's affecting the poorest nations in the

world, worst ways.

In some cases, triggering civil unrest in places like Sri Lanka and Peru.

But there's a mystery of foot here.

Unlike soy and sunflower, palm oil has not suffered any kind of production shock.

And its price started rising long before the war in Ukraine threw a wrench into the global

edible oil market.

So on today's show, the great palm oil mystery, well, it's a little mystery.

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