Articles by Hans Nicholas Jong

JAKARTA — One of the biggest palm oil growers in Indonesia has announced a plan to rehabilitate an area half the size of New York City to atone for its…

PANDUMAAN-SIPITUHUTA, Indonesia — For years, Ganjang, a member of the Pandumaan-Sipituhuta Indigenous community in Indonesia’s North Sumatra province, has been uneasy about extracting frankincense from trees in a nearby forest.…

JAKARTA — Favorable weather conditions point to a less severe forest fire season in Indonesia this year, but the burning could still compound what is now the worst coronavirus situation…

JAKARTA — Palm oil giant Korindo Group has had its membership in the Forest Stewardship Council terminated, a move that activists say sends a signal to other companies that they…

JAKARTA — Human rights abuses continue to fester in the Indonesian palm oil industry as global brands and financial institutions and investors turn a blind eye to the problem, a…

JAKARTA — The rapid development of electric vehicles looks set to overtake the biofuel infrastructure that Indonesia is investing heavily in, and could render the country’s alternative-fuel model redundant,  new…

JAKARTA — Activists in Indonesia have filed a legal challenge to controversial mining legislation passed last year and widely seen as undermining environmental protections to the advantage of mining companies.…

JAKARTA — A major palm oil company supplying to global brands like Nestlé and PepsiCo continues to source the raw commodity from plantations responsible for deforesting prime orangutan habitat in…

JAKARTA — The world’s leading palm oil sustainability certification scheme may have helped reduce deforestation and pollution in areas where it’s applied, but has had a limited impact on rural…

JAKARTA — Officials have cast doubts on a government plan that would somehow see Indonesia phase out all its coal-fired power plants while at the same time build more than…

JAKARTA — An Indonesian court has upheld a landmark 2017 ruling that all plantation data and maps in the country must be made publicly available — a ruling that the…

JAKARTA — A new report has added to growing concerns that Indonesia’s ambitious program to increase its use of palm oil-based biodiesel will drive greater deforestation across the country. The…

JAKARTA — Indonesia says it will begin retiring coal-fired power plants for good — while still continuing to build more than a hundred new ones, in the latest mixed message…

JAKARTA — Palm oil licenses covering concessions twice the size of Los Angeles have been rescinded by the local government in Indonesia’s West Papua province due to violations by the…

JAKARTA — Massive deforestation for coal mines may have exacerbated floods that recently inundated the eastern part of Indonesian Borneo, the country’s coal heartland. Fourteen villages in Berau district, East…

JAKARTA — Orangutans in Borneo have been found to physically waste away when fruit is scarce — a finding with dire implications as human-driven climate change and the destruction of…

MAKASSAR, Indonesia — Illegal logging of rainforests on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi surged by 70% in 2020, according to findings by local NGO JURnal Celebes. The group attributes the…

JAKARTA — Experts have criticized Indonesian President Joko Widodo for not announcing a more ambitious climate target at last month’s leaders’ summit called by U.S. President Joe Biden. During the…

JAKARTA — An Indonesian company with ties to Japanese conglomerates has cleared large swaths of rainforests, including habitat for critically endangered orangutans, according to a report. The company, Alas Kusuma,…

JAKARTA — Indonesia says it will stop building new coal-fired power plants after 2023 to meet its carbon-neutral goals — but the more than 100 plants to be built by…

JAKARTA — Lawmakers in Indonesia have expressed shock — shock! — that a controversial bill they passed into law last year amid near-universal criticism legitimizes illegal deforestation for oil palm…

JAKARTA — Indonesia could lose an area of tropical rainforest bigger than Belgium to oil palm plantations over the next three years without existing measures to slow this loss, activists…

JAKARTA — Three people are reportedly dead and nine are missing after a landslide hit the site of a planned hydropower plant in the only known habitat of the critically…

JAKARTA — On March 10, Suande, a member of the Dayak Indigenous community in Indonesian Borneo, said goodbye to his family before leaving his village for the police station in…

JAKARTA — A litany of loopholes and violations have undercut the Indonesian government’s forest protection policies, allowing oil palm companies to continue obtaining licenses to clear rainforests for plantations, according…

JAKARTA — Indonesia has laid out an ambitious plan to tackle deforestation, the main factor contributing to the country being one of the top global greenhouse gas emitters. But experts…

JAKARTA — The Indonesian government has announced a plan that puts the country on a path toward carbon neutrality by 2070, but activists say the timeframe is too long to…

JAKARTA — The Indonesian government’s decision to categorize the palm oil industry’s solid waste as non-hazardous has triggered environmental concerns. The industry uses huge volumes of a powdered clay called…

JAKARTA — After halting forest-clearing operations in 2020, the Digoel Agri conglomerate has apparently restarted its activities in Indonesia’s Papua province, raising alarms among local Indigenous communities who say they…

JAKARTA — A government review has identified a massive area of forest in Indonesia’s West Papua province that has been earmarked for oil palm plantations but that can still be…