Fire burns through forest in Sumatra, clearing the area for plantations © Greenpeace/Novis

It's been a few weeks since the Esperanza's tour of Indonesia wrapped up with an exhausting but thrilling week of direct action focused on various palm oil tankers, and I've since left those humid equatorial climes to return to a chilly British winter. But even though the ship has moved on to other countries and campaigns, the palm oil campaign continues and in the past few weeks there have been some developments.

The most obvious has been annual meeting of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) in Bali - this could have been the moment the industry got its act together and did something other than spin the usual load of greenwash over its involvement in the destruction of south east Asia's rainforests. Sadly, it was not to be. Although our ship painting/blockading actions drew a lot of attention, as did our earlier revelations about United Plantations and their 'sustainable' palm oil, no real progress was made.

Oil palm saplings waiting to be planted © Behring/Greenpeace

Last week, campaigners from Greenpeace South-East Asia met with palm oil producers and traders to discuss the challenges faced by the industry if it's going to get a grip on the problem of deforestation. The seminar was designed to get these companies thinking about the impact their trade is having on forests in the region, and working groups brought together industry reps and campaigners to discuss the issues involved, particularly our demand for a moratorium on clearing forest areas for palm oil plantations.

Palm oil has a huge carbon footprint © Solness/Greenpeace

Since the rapid turn-around of Unilever in the wake of our Dove campaign, our campaigners have met several times with their executives. They've been discussing how to build a coalition of allies throughout the palm oil industry which will support a moratorium on further deforestation in Indonesia to grow new plantations. As Tracy mentioned last week, even though things might go a bit quiet on this campaign for while, that doesn't mean we're not working away behind the scenes.

You may have noticed that we had quick win in our campaign to stop deforestation from palm oil a couple of weeks back. Unilever made an announcement that they would support a moratorium to protect Indonesia's rainforest from destruction just ten days after the launch of our campaign.

Potentially good news for orang-utans - Unilever announced this morning that they're now supporting our calls for a moratorium to protect Indonesia's rainforests from destruction at the hands of the expanding palm oil industry.

When we sent in our own 'orang-utans' to Unilever HQ last week to tell them that they needed to do more to stop rainforest and peatlands being cleared to make way for palm oil plantations, company executives told us that they wouldn't be forced into a quick decision on the matter.

Just some of the men, women and things who have told Dove to stop trashing rainforests

Our Dove campaign is rolling along and at the weekend it broke out into town centres up and down the country. Groups of Greenpeace volunteers were asking members of the public to pose for photos which are now part of our growing Flickr gallery full of people who think it's a bit mad to chop down rainforests just to make soap. We've had young 'uns, old 'uns and even a Cyberman - if you've had your picture taken, see if you can find it and send it to the people behind Dove (details below).

The orang-utans may have retreated from Unilever's premises for the time being, but our campaign to protect Indonesia's rainforests from the expanding palm oil industry has only just started. As well as an advert appearing in today's edition of the Times, commuters at Blackfriars tube station in London this morning saw some of our special 'Dove' adverts alongside the escalators. Blackfriars is the nearest station to Unilever's London headquarters, so a large number of their staff should have seen them on their way into work. Watch the video below for a taste of what they saw.

A couple of videos that throw our new Dove campaign into sharp relief. The first is a rather stonking effort from our international office, taking Dove's own Onslaught film as it's inspiration (you can see the original here). The second, some highlights from the fun and games in London and Merseyside earlier today. Enjoy.

As of 2pm, orang-utans are still gracing Unilever premises in London and Port Sunlight and are showing no signs of swinging down. They've also appeared on the continent, popping up in Italy and the Netherlands. Unilever's Rome HQ has been paid a visit and employees were blocked from entering the building by a large box placed in front of the entrance, with the slogan 'Stop Dove destroying rainforests' emblazoned upon it. In Rotterdam, six volunteers were trying to scale Unilever's waterfront offices to hang a banner with a similar message, but unfortunately strong winds forced them down.