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News articles on indonesia's forest moratorium
Mongabay.com news articles on indonesia's forest moratorium in blog format. Updated regularly.
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(05/22/2012) Indonesia is making 'encouraging' progress on its push to reduce deforestation by improving governance over its forests and peatlands, but still needs to do more to enforce environmental laws, said the head of the country's Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD+) task force speaking at a press conference Monday in Jakarta. Kuntoro Mangkusubroto, Head of the Indonesian President’s Delivery Unit for Development Monitoring and Oversight (UKP4) and Chair of the REDD+ Task Force, said an effort to develop a map of Indonesia's forests and forest concessions has been completed, although the Ministry of Forestry has yet to deliver the map to President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, missing last Friday's deadline. The map serves as the basis for a two-year moratorium on new forestry concessions in primary forests and peatlands had been completed.
(12/21/2011) Indonesia exempted 3.6 million hectares of forests and peatlands from protected status under its two-year moratorium on forest concessions, according to a revised version of its moratorium map released near the end of climate talks in Durban. The new Indicative Map includes 10.7 million hectares of peatlands, down from 15.5 million hectares in the previous version of the map that defines areas off-limits for new concessions. Some 1.2 million hectares of previously unprotected "primary forest" has been added to the moratorium area, resulted in a net decline of 3.6 million hectares under the moratorium, according to analysis by Daemeter Consulting, an Indonesia-based forestry consultancy.
(10/18/2011) Last week Indonesian immigration officials in Jakarta blocked Greenpeace director John Sauven from entering the country. Sauven, who two weeks earlier had obtained the proper business visa for his visit from the Indonesian embassy in London, was scheduled to convene with his team in Jakarta, travel to the island of Sumatra, and meet with officials and Indonesian businesses at a forestry conference. The following day, Greenpeace campaigner Andrew Tait was harassed by unknown individuals who attempted to serve him with a deportation warrant.
(06/28/2011) Indonesia's Ministry of Forestry is already undermining the moratorium on new forestry concessions on peatlands and in primary forest areas, alleges a new report from Greenomics-Indonesia. The report, The Toothless Moratorium, claims that a new decree from the Ministry of Forestry converts 81,490 hectares of forest protected under the moratorium into logging areas. The area affected is larger than Singapore.
(06/27/2011) A raft of new studies show that protecting Southeast Asia's forests could provide an enormous economic lift for Southeast Asia. Indeed, the studies suggest, forest conservation, sustainable forestry, and agricultural improvements, along with investments in clean energy, could spur the rise of regional "Green Tiger" economies whose development levels surpass even those achieved during the boom years of the 1990's. The studies provide a striking rebuttal to palm oil and timber industries' claims that deforestation is necessary for the region's growth.
(06/21/2011) Indonesia's REDD+ Task Force will investigate charges that PT Menteng Jaya Sawit Perdana (PT Menteng), a palm oil company owned by Malaysia-based Kuala Lumpur Kepong Berhad (KLK), has cleared peat forest in breach of the country's newly-signed moratorium on the granting of new forestry licenses on peatlands and in primary forest areas. The allegation was levied by the Environmental Investigation Agency, an international NGO, and Telapak, an Indonesian group, after an on-the-ground undercover investigation. EIA and Telapak found that PT Menteng had cleared peat forest near Sampit in Indonesia's Central Kalimantan province without securing proper licenses.
(06/21/2011) Indonesia's moratorium on new concessions in primary forest areas and peatlands "completely ignores" the existence of community forestry management licenses, jeopardizing efforts to improve the sustainability of Indonesia's forest sector and ensure benefits from forest use reach local people, say environmentalists. According to Greenomics-Indonesia, a Jakarta-based NGO, community and village forestry licenses are not among the many exemptions spelled under the presidential instruction that defines the moratorium. The instruction, issued last month, grants exemptions for industrial developers and allows business-as-usual in secondary forest areas by the pulp and paper, mining and palm oil industries.
(05/27/2011) Lack of clarity makes it difficult to assess whether Indonesia's moratorium on new logging concessions in primary forest areas and peatlands will actually reduce greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation, according to a new comprehensive assessment of the instruction issued last week by Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. The analysis, conducted by Philip Wells and Gary Paoli of Indonesia-based Daemeter Consulting, concludes that while the moratorium is "potentially a powerful instrument" for achieving the Indonesian president's goals of 7 percent annual growth and a 26 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from a projected 2020 baseline, the language of the moratorium leaves significant areas open for interpretation, potentially offering loopholes for developers.
(05/20/2011) The moratorium on permits for new concessions in primary rainforests and peatlands will have a limited impact in reducing deforestation in Indonesia, say environmentalists who have reviewed the instruction released today by Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. The moratorium, which took effect January 1, 2011, but had yet to be defined until today's presidential decree, aims to slow Indonesia's deforestation rate, which is among the highest in the world. Indonesia agreed to establish the moratorium as part of its reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD) agreement with Norway. Under the pact, Norway will provide up to a billion dollars in funds contingent on Indonesia's success in curtailing destruction of carbon-dense forests and peatlands.
(05/16/2011) Deep in the rainforests of Malaysian Borneo in the late 1980s, researchers made an incredible discovery: the bark of a species of peat swamp tree yielded an extract with potent anti-HIV activity. An anti-HIV drug made from the compound is now nearing clinical trials. It could be worth hundreds of millions of dollars a year and help improve the lives of millions of people. This story is significant for Indonesia because its forests house a similar species. In fact, Indonesia's forests probably contain many other potentially valuable species, although our understanding of these is poor. Given Indonesia's biological richness — Indonesia has the highest number of plant and animal species of any country on the planet — shouldn't policymakers and businesses be giving priority to protecting and understanding rainforests, peatlands, mountains, coral reefs, and mangrove ecosystems, rather than destroying them for commodities?
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