Articles by Hans Nicholas Jong

JAKARTA — A court in Indonesia has ordered palm oil company PT Arjuna Utama Sawit to pay the equivalent of $18.6 million in fines and damages for fires on its…

JAKARTA — Fires in Indonesia have razed an area the size of Puerto Rico, following a sharp spike in burning in September. The fires this year, the worst since 2015,…

BRUSSELS — The European Parliament will proceed with phasing out palm oil-based biofuel by 2030 despite threats of retaliatory action by Indonesia and Malaysia, the world’s biggest producers of the…

AMSTERDAM — Hemsi has been in jail three times since 2006 and filed pleas with 13 government institutions in Indonesia during that period — all in an effort to fight…

JAKARTA — At least three companies whose concessions were burned in the 2015 fires that razed huge swaths of forest in Indonesia are also caught up in this year’s fires,…

JAKARTA — Indonesian lawmakers have chosen not to pass a raft of controversial legislation that critics say would dismantle environmental and social protections, in the face of massive student-led protests.…

JAKARTA — Indonesia’s parliament is rushing to pass a controversial bill on coal and mineral mining before the current legislators’ term ends on Sept. 30, defying a massive public outcry…

JAKARTA — Laode Muhammad Syarif has been spearheading a critical war against corruption in Indonesia for the past four years. Since December 2015, he’s served as a leader of the…

JAKARTA — A severely injured and malnourished orangutan has been rescued from a plantation near a Sumatra forest where a hydropower project threatens the only known habitat of this particular…

JAKARTA — The Forest Stewardship Council, the world’s foremost body certifying the sustainable forestry industry, has delayed the publication of its findings into a palm oil company’s operations in Indonesia,…

JAKARTA — Indonesia’s president has admitted negligence on the part of the government, as top officials engage in a blame game amid the worst spate of forest fires since 2015…

JAKARTA — Indonesia’s environment minister risks undermining the country’s credibility if she continues denying, in the face of overwhelming data, that haze from Indonesian forest fires is affecting neighboring Malaysia…

JAKARTA — The Indonesian government has banned food labeled as being “palm oil-free,” in its latest push to protect the commodity against a growing consumer backlash. The Drug and Food…

JAKARTA — More than 80 percent of oil palm plantations in Indonesia, the world’s biggest producer of the crop, are operating in violation of numerous regulations, a government audit has…

JAKARTA — Indonesia, the world’s biggest producer of palm oil, is anticipating a boost in exports of the commodity to China, taking advantage of an opportunity opened up by the…

JAKARTA — Japan is exporting pollution and endangering public health overseas by funding coal-fired power plants that wouldn’t meet the strict emissions standards it imposes at home, a new report…

JAKARTA — Indonesia’s president has made permanent a temporary moratorium on forest-clearing permits for plantations and logging. It’s a policy the government says has proven effective in curtailing deforestation, but…

Three years after forest fires in Indonesia sent huge volumes of smoke billowing into Malaysia and Singapore, the Southeast Asian neighbors are dealing with a repeat of the “embarrassing” transboundary…

JAKARTA — Indonesia’s highest court has upheld a ruling holding the government, including the president, liable for the disastrous forest fires and resultant haze that blanketed large swaths of the…

JAKARTA — Environmental activists say they fear for what’s left of Indonesia’s tropical rainforests, following a fiery call by President Joko Widodo threatening action against anyone hindering investment in the…