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	<channel>
		<title>Conservation news</title>
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		<description>Environmental science and conservation news</description>
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	<url>https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/05/16160320/cropped-mongabay_icon-32x32.png</url>
	<title>News on Anonymous Companies</title>
	<link>https://news.mongabay.com/list/anonymous-companies/</link>
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				<item>
					<title>A new tool to peer into fishing networks: Q&#038;A with Austin Brush of C4ADS</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/a-new-tool-to-peer-into-fishing-networks-qa-with-austin-brush-of-c4ads/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/a-new-tool-to-peer-into-fishing-networks-qa-with-austin-brush-of-c4ads/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Nov 2022 03:19:03 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Melati Kaye]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Philip Jacobson]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2022/11/20140157/galapagos_170074-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=262787</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Atlantic Ocean, Global, and Pacific Ocean]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Crime, data, Environment, Fishing, Governance, Illegal Fishing, Oceans, Technology, Transparency, and Wildtech]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[One in five fish sold globally is caught illegally, according to C4ADS, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank that tracks illicit trade networks. That’s between 11 million and 26 million metric tons of fish annually. C4ADS plans to launch Triton, a web-based analysis tool to examine ownership within the global fishing fleet, by the end of [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[One in five fish sold globally is caught illegally, according to C4ADS, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank that tracks illicit trade networks. That’s between 11 million and 26 million metric tons of fish annually. C4ADS plans to launch Triton, a web-based analysis tool to examine ownership within the global fishing fleet, by the end of 2022. The plan is for the tool to enable government monitors, fishery certification bodies, journalists and researchers to better track fishing fleets and seafood source companies to understand who profits from sales of fish, and who is responsible for labor and environmental practices aboard fishing vessels. With this increased transparency and oversight, the aim is ultimately to reduce illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing, known by the acronym IUU. Mongabay interviewed Austin Brush, the IUU portfolio manager at C4ADS, about Triton. Mongabay: First off, how would you describe Triton? Austin Brush: Triton is a transparency portal that we are developing at C4ADS. It consists of two primary components: the vessel and company database, which has ownership information, key identifying information for vessels and companies, and then there are the analytical products, which includes risk alerts and dossiers on fishing vessels in general. The vessel and company database we are developing is for industrial fishing vessels. Currently it is focused on longline and reefer vessels. Triton users will be able to explore those relationships graphically, see the different kinds of networks between company and vessel, track that relationship through officers, directors, shareholders. For each entity, there will&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/a-new-tool-to-peer-into-fishing-networks-qa-with-austin-brush-of-c4ads/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/11/a-new-tool-to-peer-into-fishing-networks-qa-with-austin-brush-of-c4ads/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-262787</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Palm oil firm hit by mass permit revocation still clearing forest in Indonesia</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/02/palm-oil-firm-hit-by-mass-permit-revocation-still-clearing-forest-in-indonesia/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/02/palm-oil-firm-hit-by-mass-permit-revocation-still-clearing-forest-in-indonesia/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>22 Feb 2022 09:35:46 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Asrida ElisabethPhilip Jacobson]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Philip Jacobson]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[global forests]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2022/02/22020952/7640091254_27f51a6b02_k-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=252912</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Jokowi Commitments]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, New Guinea, Papua, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Anonymous Companies, Deforestation, Drivers Of Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Industrial Agriculture, Land Conflict, Law, Law Enforcement, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, Protected Areas, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Threats To Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[JAYAPURA, Indonesia, and NEW YORK — A palm oil firm that was among more than 100 companies targeted in a mass cancellation of permits for plantations by Indonesia’s environment ministry on Jan. 6 has bulldozed more than 50 hectares (125 acres) of rainforest since that date. The finding underscores the limits of the policy and [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[JAYAPURA, Indonesia, and NEW YORK — A palm oil firm that was among more than 100 companies targeted in a mass cancellation of permits for plantations by Indonesia’s environment ministry on Jan. 6 has bulldozed more than 50 hectares (125 acres) of rainforest since that date. The finding underscores the limits of the policy and raises questions about how far President Joko Widodo’s administration is willing to go to rein in the nation’s chaotic land-use practices. After lying moribund for more than two years, the company, PT Permata Nusa Mandiri (PNM), sprang into action in the weeks after the revocations were announced, carving a road and several plantation blocks out of its land concession in Jayapura, a district in Papua province. During a visit to the site in January, Mongabay observed cars, heavy equipment and workers pacing around the newly created road. The company camp, abandoned for the past two years, looked lively again. A truck loaded with drums apparently filled with fuel was parked on site. The clearance remains ongoing, satellite imagery shows, according to Albert ten Kate, a researcher at Amsterdam-based sustainability consultancy Aidenvironment. “It is not just a road anymore,” ten Kate wrote in an email. “A lot of plantation blocks are carved out, over an area of a few hundred hectares and there also has been some clear-cutting.” A road made by a palm oil company by clearing the forest in Jayapura Regency, Papua. Image by Asrida Elisabeth/ Mongabay Indonesia. A satellite image of the clearing&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2022/02/palm-oil-firm-hit-by-mass-permit-revocation-still-clearing-forest-in-indonesia/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2022/02/palm-oil-firm-hit-by-mass-permit-revocation-still-clearing-forest-in-indonesia/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-252912</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Papua tribe moves to block clearing of its ancestral forest for palm oil</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/01/papua-tribe-moves-to-block-clearing-of-its-ancestral-forest-for-palm-oil/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/01/papua-tribe-moves-to-block-clearing-of-its-ancestral-forest-for-palm-oil/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Jan 2021 16:25:53 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Hans Nicholas Jong]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Hans Nicholas Jong]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2021/01/21143855/IMG-20210113-WA0009-e1611246259103-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=238838</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Land rights and extractives]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, Papua, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Anonymous Companies, Business, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Crime, Deforestation, Drivers Of Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Forest Destruction, Forest Loss, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Conflict, Land Grabbing, Land Rights, Logging, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[This article was co-produced with The Gecko Project. JAKARTA — Indigenous people in Indonesia’s easternmost Papua province are protesting against a company that’s preparing to raze their ancestral forest for a plantation megaproject plagued by allegations of irregularities and wrongdoing. Members of the Auyu tribe are demanding the government freeze the operations of PT Indo [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[This article was co-produced with The Gecko Project. JAKARTA — Indigenous people in Indonesia’s easternmost Papua province are protesting against a company that’s preparing to raze their ancestral forest for a plantation megaproject plagued by allegations of irregularities and wrongdoing. Members of the Auyu tribe are demanding the government freeze the operations of PT Indo Asiana Lestari (IAL), whose 39,190-hectare (96,840-acre) concession forms one chunk of the larger Tanah Merah project that has been fought over by competing groups of investors over the past decade. If developed in full, the Tanah Merah project would result in the clearance of 280,000 hectares (692,000 acres) of the third-largest stretch of rainforest on the planet, to be replaced with several contiguous oil palm estates run by various companies — some of which are owned by unknown investors hiding behind anonymously held firms in the Middle East. Palm oil, used in everything from snack foods and cosmetics to biofuels, is one of Indonesia’s leading export commodities. But its production is associated with a range of problems, from climate change and wildfires to labor rights abuses and land grabbing. A map of the island of New Guinea, which is split between Indonesia and Papua New Guinea, and the location of Boven Digoel in it. Besides problems with corporate secrecy, the Tanah Merah project has also highlighted the often chaotic licensing processes underpinning the industry. Some of the permits for the project were signed by a politician who was serving out a prison sentence for corruption.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2021/01/papua-tribe-moves-to-block-clearing-of-its-ancestral-forest-for-palm-oil/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2021/01/papua-tribe-moves-to-block-clearing-of-its-ancestral-forest-for-palm-oil/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-238838</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>The Consultant: Why did a palm oil conglomerate pay $22m to an unnamed ‘expert’ in Papua?</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/06/the-consultant-why-did-a-palm-oil-conglomerate-pay-22m-to-an-unnamed-expert-in-papua/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/06/the-consultant-why-did-a-palm-oil-conglomerate-pay-22m-to-an-unnamed-expert-in-papua/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>25 Jun 2020 09:47:00 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2020/06/25004409/MURUGIAH_Papua_FINAL_RGB-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=231785</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Investigation]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, New Guinea, Papua, South Korea, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Anonymous Companies, Business, Certification, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corporate Social Responsibility, Corruption, Crime, Deforestation, Development, Environment, Environmental Law, Forest Destruction, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Green, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Rights, Land Use Change, Law Enforcement, Logging, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, Primary Forests, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Saving Rainforests, Solutions, Threats To Rainforests, Traditional People, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[(Baca dalam Bahasa Indonesia.) Part 1: ‘Maybe they didn’t expect us to find it’ In April 2019, an Indonesian delegate stepped onto the stage at a conference hosted by Interpol, the international police organization, at its Singapore headquarters. Among the audience were dozens of law enforcement agents from across the world, there to learn about [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[(Baca dalam Bahasa Indonesia.) Part 1: ‘Maybe they didn’t expect us to find it’ In April 2019, an Indonesian delegate stepped onto the stage at a conference hosted by Interpol, the international police organization, at its Singapore headquarters. Among the audience were dozens of law enforcement agents from across the world, there to learn about how white-collar crimes and corruption underpinned the ongoing destruction of the world’s rainforests. Interpol’s interest in forest crime had been stimulated by the billions of dollars the World Bank had calculated developing countries were losing in tax revenues to the global trade in illicit timber every year. There was a growing recognition among enforcement agencies that the crime scene was not only in rainforests. It was also in the dark recesses of the global financial system, through which bribes were paid and profits laundered. The delegate, from an Indonesian nonprofit, walked the audience through a “suspicious” $22 million payment made by a conglomerate, which she declined to identify in her presentation. In corporate filings, the transaction had been described as a “consultancy fee,” paid to an unnamed “expert” who had helped obtain the rights to develop a vast oil palm plantation in the Indonesian province of Papua. A river winds through the interior of Papua province, home to the world&#8217;s third-largest rainforest after the Amazon and Congo rainforests. It was a curious payment. In Indonesia, permits for plantations have no significant official costs, the delegate noted, as dozens of suited enforcement agents watched from the&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/06/the-consultant-why-did-a-palm-oil-conglomerate-pay-22m-to-an-unnamed-expert-in-papua/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/06/the-consultant-why-did-a-palm-oil-conglomerate-pay-22m-to-an-unnamed-expert-in-papua/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-231785</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>New player starts clearing rainforest in world’s biggest oil palm project</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/03/new-player-starts-clearing-rainforest-in-worlds-biggest-oil-palm-project/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/03/new-player-starts-clearing-rainforest-in-worlds-biggest-oil-palm-project/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>24 Mar 2020 08:43:12 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/11/28102956/NNG_3756-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=228181</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Investigation, Jokowi Commitments, and Land rights and extractives]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, New Guinea, Papua, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Anonymous Companies, Climate Change, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Crime, Deforestation, Drivers Of Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Forest Carbon, Forest Destruction, Forest Loss, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Land Grabbing, Logging, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[This article was co-published with The Gecko Project. A new company has begun clearing rainforest in an area of Indonesia’s easternmost Papua province earmarked to become the world’s largest oil palm plantation, in a vast project that has been mired in allegations of lawbreaking. If seen through to completion, the Tanah Merah project will generate [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[This article was co-published with The Gecko Project. A new company has begun clearing rainforest in an area of Indonesia’s easternmost Papua province earmarked to become the world’s largest oil palm plantation, in a vast project that has been mired in allegations of lawbreaking. If seen through to completion, the Tanah Merah project will generate an estimated $6 billion in timber and create a plantation almost twice the size of London, at the heart of the largest tract of intact rainforest left in Asia. It will also release an immense amount of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, at a time when Indonesia has committed to reducing emissions from deforestation. Since March of last year, the Digoel Agri Group, founded by a politically connected Jakarta family and now backed by an investor from New Zealand, has bulldozed 170 hectares (420 acres) of rainforest in a section of the project previously spared from land clearing, satellite imagery shows. The clearance amounts to a fraction of the 280,000 hectares (692,000 acres) allocated for the project, now controlled by several different conglomerates. But it signals that deforestation could quickly accelerate after a decade of false starts by other investors. A satellite view of Digoel Agri&#8217;s forest clearance, seen in late November 2019. Since it was first conceived in 2007, the rights to the project have changed hands several times, involving a string of investors who have deployed crude and complex corporate secrecy techniques to hide their identities. The licensing process for the project has&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/03/new-player-starts-clearing-rainforest-in-worlds-biggest-oil-palm-project/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2020/03/new-player-starts-clearing-rainforest-in-worlds-biggest-oil-palm-project/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-228181</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Analysis: The Tanah Merah project is a bellwether for Jokowi&#8217;s permit review</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/12/analysis-the-tanah-merah-project-is-a-bellwether-for-jokowis-permit-review/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/12/analysis-the-tanah-merah-project-is-a-bellwether-for-jokowis-permit-review/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>11 Dec 2019 22:54:10 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/11/28085306/ID0517-PAPUA-DJI2705-NS-073-768x511.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=225308</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, New Guinea, Papua, Southeast Asia, and West Papua]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Anonymous Companies, Climate Change, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Crime, Deforestation, Drivers Of Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Forest Carbon, Forest Destruction, Forest Loss, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Land Grabbing, Logging, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[This article was co-published with The Gecko Project. When Indonesian government officials received a credible allegation that the permits underpinning a giant oil palm plantation project in Papua province had been falsified, the logical next step might have been to launch a criminal investigation. After all, the consequences were huge: The project would result in [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[This article was co-published with The Gecko Project. When Indonesian government officials received a credible allegation that the permits underpinning a giant oil palm plantation project in Papua province had been falsified, the logical next step might have been to launch a criminal investigation. After all, the consequences were huge: The project would result in the clearance of an area of rainforest twice the size of London, affecting thousands of indigenous people. If the allegation stood up, it was a fraud perpetrated against the government itself. However, as The Gecko Project and Mongabay revealed this week, the government has instead allowed the Tanah Merah project to go ahead. Officials have buried the allegation, cutting a deal with the companies involved to allow them to continue clearing forest. “It’s done,” one official involved told us. The case provides a rare glimpse into how competing government priorities are playing out behind closed doors, and which is winning. On the one hand, President Joko Widodo has pledged to rein in the palm oil sector, which has been plagued by illegalities and corruption widely seen as exacerbating its role in driving deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions. On the other hand, the president has expressed his intent to bring “development” to remote regions. In this instance, at least three government ministries have turned a blind eye to a credible allegation of criminality that will have enormous environmental impacts, in the interests of protecting investment. Indonesia has long struggled to impose order on plantation and mining&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/12/analysis-the-tanah-merah-project-is-a-bellwether-for-jokowis-permit-review/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-225308</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Revealed: Government officials say permits for mega-plantation in Papua were falsified</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/12/revealed-government-officials-say-permits-for-mega-plantation-in-papua-were-falsified/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/12/revealed-government-officials-say-permits-for-mega-plantation-in-papua-were-falsified/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>10 Dec 2019 08:00:21 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2019/12/09042514/NNG_4266-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=225156</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Jokowi Commitments]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, Jakarta, New Guinea, Papua, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Anonymous Companies, Climate Change, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Crime, Deforestation, Drivers Of Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Forest Carbon, Forest Destruction, Forest Loss, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Land Grabbing, Logging, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[This article was co-published with The Gecko Project. Indonesian government officials have alleged that permits underpinning a multi-billion dollar plantation project in Papua province were falsified, leading to the criminal clear-cutting of a vast area of rainforest. The land is being opened up by investors whose identity is hidden behind anonymously owned companies, as part [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[This article was co-published with The Gecko Project. Indonesian government officials have alleged that permits underpinning a multi-billion dollar plantation project in Papua province were falsified, leading to the criminal clear-cutting of a vast area of rainforest. The land is being opened up by investors whose identity is hidden behind anonymously owned companies, as part of a plan to develop an oil palm plantation almost twice the size of London in the remote region. Officials from Papua province’s investment agency say that permits that could only have been issued by their office were falsified at a critical stage of the licensing process. While the permits bear the signature of the former head of the agency, he has reported in writing that it was forged. Approximately 83 square kilometers (32 square miles) of rainforest has been cleared on the basis of the permits, deforestation that is described in internal government correspondence as a potential criminal act. The allegation has been formally raised within the government on at least three occasions and multiple ministries are now aware of it, The Gecko Project and Mongabay have found. Instead of reporting the allegation to law enforcement, however, officials have struck an agreement allowing the developers to continue operating, provided they reapply for their permits. Informed of the case, Laode Syarif, a deputy head of Indonesia&#8217;s anti-corruption agency, said it merited an investigation. “If the signature of the investment agency chief was forged, that’s a crime,” he said in an interview. In a separate allegation,&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/12/revealed-government-officials-say-permits-for-mega-plantation-in-papua-were-falsified/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/12/revealed-government-officials-say-permits-for-mega-plantation-in-papua-were-falsified/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-225156</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Follow the permits: How to identify corruption red flags in Indonesian land deals</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/12/follow-the-permits-how-to-identify-corruption-red-flags-in-indonesian-land-deals/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/12/follow-the-permits-how-to-identify-corruption-red-flags-in-indonesian-land-deals/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>04 Dec 2019 06:55:35 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2019/12/05073643/kalbar_drone_191017-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=224992</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Investigation]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Coal, Corruption, Deforestation, Environment, Palm Oil, Plantations, and Transparency]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[This story was co-published with The Gecko Project.  When Rita Widyasari, the former head of Kutai Kartanegara district in Indonesian Borneo, was sentenced to 10 years in prison last year for taking bribes in connection with a string of plantation and mining projects, it exemplified the success of the nation’s anti-corruption agency in closing such [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[This story was co-published with The Gecko Project.  When Rita Widyasari, the former head of Kutai Kartanegara district in Indonesian Borneo, was sentenced to 10 years in prison last year for taking bribes in connection with a string of plantation and mining projects, it exemplified the success of the nation’s anti-corruption agency in closing such cases. Since its formation in 2004, investigations by the anti-graft agency, known as the KPK, have led to the conviction of a string of politicians for similar offenses. But research by the KPK, political scientists, activists and journalists suggests the problem extends far beyond the cases that have gone to court. The proliferation of permits for mines and plantations over the same period has left a tapestry of projects — some legitimate, some less so — across Indonesia. These are ripe for investigation by journalists, activists and citizens. For those who lack the expansive powers of the KPK, finding evidence of corruption in the issuance of licenses can be challenging. But in investigations by The Gecko Project and Mongabay over the past three years, we have identified a number of red flags — clues that some impropriety has potentially taken place. Permits, and the ways in which they are traded between brokers and investors, leave a paper trail that can be interrogated to find these clues. This article defines these red flags, explains what they reveal, and details the methods that can be used to identify them. While they do not individually provide irrefutable evidence&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/12/follow-the-permits-how-to-identify-corruption-red-flags-in-indonesian-land-deals/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/12/follow-the-permits-how-to-identify-corruption-red-flags-in-indonesian-land-deals/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-224992</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>10 takeaways from Indonesia&#8217;s grassroots #SaveAru success</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/10/10-takeaways-from-indonesias-grassroots-savearu-success/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/10/10-takeaways-from-indonesias-grassroots-savearu-success/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>28 Oct 2019 11:26:52 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2019/10/28110819/1_OW9oHWJJmo46RBNtPIQfDA-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=223889</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, Maluku, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Activism, Agriculture, Animals, Anonymous Companies, Avoided Deforestation, Biodiversity, Birds, Climate Change, Community Development, Community Forests, Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Crime, Deforestation, Development, Drivers Of Deforestation, Endangered Species, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Forest Carbon, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Green, Law Enforcement, Logging, Mangroves, Plantations, Primary Forests, Protected Areas, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Sustainability, Sustainable Development, Sustainable Forest Management, Traditional People, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[This article was co-published with The Gecko Project.  This month Mongabay and The Gecko Project published “Saving Aru,” an article chronicling how the people of Indonesia’s Aru Islands thwarted a plan to turn much of their homeland into a vast sugarcane plantation. To halt the project, they had to overcome huge odds. In Indonesia, a [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[This article was co-published with The Gecko Project.  This month Mongabay and The Gecko Project published “Saving Aru,” an article chronicling how the people of Indonesia’s Aru Islands thwarted a plan to turn much of their homeland into a vast sugarcane plantation. To halt the project, they had to overcome huge odds. In Indonesia, a young democracy still recovering from three decades of military rule, companies usually succeed in their efforts to annex indigenous lands. The country has consequently become blanketed in concessions for plantations and mines that have provoked thousands of land conflicts. By the time the Aruese became aware of the sugarcane project, pushed through in secret by a politician who was later jailed for corruption, it was nearly too late to stop it. If it went ahead, it would replace Aru’s rainforests with a sea of sugarcane more than half the size of Puerto Rico, destroying the existing livelihoods and food supplies of tens of thousands of people. The Aru Islands lie between Australia and New Guinea, in Indonesia&#8217;s Maluku province. It would also send Indonesia’s greenhouse gas emissions, already among the world’s highest, skyrocketing. To save Aru, its people and their allies needed to force the government to cancel the project. Here are some of the keys to their success. 1. They built an ‘information chain’ to take stories from the interior of Aru to the world When the Aruese first learned of the project, they filled the streets of Dobo, Aru’s main town, in protest.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/10/10-takeaways-from-indonesias-grassroots-savearu-success/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/10/10-takeaways-from-indonesias-grassroots-savearu-success/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-223889</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Saving Aru: The epic battle to save the islands that inspired the theory of evolution</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/10/saving-aru-the-epic-battle-to-save-the-islands-that-inspired-the-theory-of-evolution/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/10/saving-aru-the-epic-battle-to-save-the-islands-that-inspired-the-theory-of-evolution/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>09 Oct 2019 09:04:03 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2019/10/08181844/MURUGIAH_Aru-Story__WEB_RGB_v9-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=223185</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, Maluku, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Activism, Agriculture, Animals, Anonymous Companies, Avoided Deforestation, Biodiversity, Birds, Climate Change, Community Development, Community Forests, Community-based Conservation, Conservation, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Crime, Deforestation, Development, Drivers Of Deforestation, Endangered Species, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Forest Carbon, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Green, Law Enforcement, Logging, Mangroves, Plantations, Primary Forests, Protected Areas, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Sustainability, Sustainable Development, Sustainable Forest Management, Traditional People, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[GLO-4060 QZA-18/0341, G-1801-55636, 2018-67916]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[This story was co-published with The Gecko Project. Additional support was provided by Earthsight. (Baca dalam Bahasa Indonesia.) I. The movement begins Late one rainy night in August 2013, a college student named Collin Leppuy arrived at the doorstep of Father Jacky Manuputty, a church minister in the coastal city of Ambon, Indonesia. He had [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[This story was co-published with The Gecko Project. Additional support was provided by Earthsight. (Baca dalam Bahasa Indonesia.) I. The movement begins Late one rainy night in August 2013, a college student named Collin Leppuy arrived at the doorstep of Father Jacky Manuputty, a church minister in the coastal city of Ambon, Indonesia. He had come to ask for help; his homeland was under threat. Collin, then 23, had grown up in the Aru Islands, a heavily forested archipelago in the eastern margins of the world’s largest island nation. He was studying social welfare policy at a university in Ambon, the capital of Maluku province. Collin had recently organized rallies in the city against a corrupt politician who had governed Aru for nearly a decade. Convicted of siphoning off millions of dollars in state funds, the politician had absconded before law enforcers finally caught up with him. Collin had felt proud of the outcome, but this gave way to a renewed sense of urgency when he discovered what else the politician had done before his arrest. For decades, Aru had escaped the attention of the companies clearing Indonesia’s rainforests. But as the jungles of Java, Sumatra and Borneo dwindled, those in search of timber and agricultural land began to look east. Aru now lay in the sights of a company called the Menara Group. Collin had learned that before he was ousted from office, the politician had secretly approved a plan by Menara to plant sugarcane across nearly two-thirds of&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/10/saving-aru-the-epic-battle-to-save-the-islands-that-inspired-the-theory-of-evolution/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/10/saving-aru-the-epic-battle-to-save-the-islands-that-inspired-the-theory-of-evolution/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-223185</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>A Papuan village finds its forest caught in a web of corporate secrecy</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/09/a-papuan-village-finds-its-forest-caught-in-a-web-of-corporate-secrecy/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/09/a-papuan-village-finds-its-forest-caught-in-a-web-of-corporate-secrecy/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>16 Sep 2019 13:08:06 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/11/28101529/ID0517-PAPUA-DJI2505-NS-087-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=222492</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Jokowi Commitments]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, Malaysia, New Guinea, Papua, Southeast Asia, and United Arab Emirates]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Anonymous Companies, Climate Change, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Deforestation, Drivers Of Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Forest Destruction, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Green, Indigenous Peoples, Land Conflict, Land Grabbing, Land Use Change, Law Enforcement, Logging, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, Primary Forests, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Threats To Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[G-1801-55636, 2018-67916, GLO-4060 QZA-18/0341]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[This article was co-published with The Gecko Project.  When a string of palm oil companies arrived in the village of Anggai, in a heavily forested corner of Indonesia’s easternmost Papua province, Robertus Meyanggi hoped they would help his community prosper. Before long, his optimism faded to despair. The promises to build schools and health clinics [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[This article was co-published with The Gecko Project.  When a string of palm oil companies arrived in the village of Anggai, in a heavily forested corner of Indonesia’s easternmost Papua province, Robertus Meyanggi hoped they would help his community prosper. Before long, his optimism faded to despair. The promises to build schools and health clinics and provide electricity never materialized, years after the firms, said to be owned by the same conglomerate, set about clearing rainforest to make way for an oil palm plantation. Meanwhile, villagers’ requests for basic information about the project, such as its size and precise location, were met with stonewalling. Even copies of signed agreements between some clan representatives and the companies were withheld from community members. Soon there were more companies, one constructing a giant sawmill to suck in timber from their land, but no more clarity. “We don’t even know who owns these companies,” said Robertus, an indigenous Auyu in his mid-20s. “We’re completely in the dark.” Anggai is one of hundreds, if not thousands, of villages across Indonesia that has become embroiled in a land-rights conflict with a natural resource firm. In many cases, these companies are managed through complex corporate structures that render their true owners impossible to discern. The companies in Anggai, for example, are owned by holding companies in the United Arab Emirates cities of Dubai and Ras Al Khaimah — two of the world’s secrecy jurisdictions, where regulations are deliberately crafted to enable shareholders to hide their identities. This&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/09/a-papuan-village-finds-its-forest-caught-in-a-web-of-corporate-secrecy/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/09/a-papuan-village-finds-its-forest-caught-in-a-web-of-corporate-secrecy/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-222492</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>What we learned from two years of investigating corrupt land deals in Indonesia</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/05/what-we-learned-from-two-years-of-investigating-corrupt-land-deals-in-indonesia/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2019/05/what-we-learned-from-two-years-of-investigating-corrupt-land-deals-in-indonesia/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>08 May 2019 02:55:45 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[MongabayThe Gecko Project]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/10/30075755/GP-8264-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=217850</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia for Sale]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, New Guinea, Papua, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Agriculture, Anonymous Companies, Climate Change, Corporate Social Responsibility, Corruption, Crime, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Land Conflict, Land Grabbing, Law Enforcement, Mongabay investigation, Palm Oil, Plantations, Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[2018-67916, G-1801-55636, GLO-4060 QZA-18/0341]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Just over two years ago, The Gecko Project and Mongabay set out to investigate the hidden story behind twin environmental and social crises unfolding in Indonesia. The country’s rainforests, the third most expansive in the world, were falling at the highest rate since detailed measurements began. Every year, carbon-rich peat swamps across the archipelago were [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Just over two years ago, The Gecko Project and Mongabay set out to investigate the hidden story behind twin environmental and social crises unfolding in Indonesia. The country’s rainforests, the third most expansive in the world, were falling at the highest rate since detailed measurements began. Every year, carbon-rich peat swamps across the archipelago were drying out and turning into a conflagration, churning noxious greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. In thousands of villages across the archipelago, people found themselves locked into intractable conflicts with their neighbors, companies and the government, over control of land. The common thread was the proliferation of industrial-scale plantations, to produce palm oil and other commodities. For more than a decade, these giant estates were the leading cause of deforestation in the country. The conflicts over land emerged as the ancestral forests and farmlands of rural communities were transferred by the state to the companies behind the plantations. Rainforest cleared to make way for an oil palm plantation belonging to a Malaysian company in Gunung Mas, a landlocked district in Indonesian Borneo. These were crises of global significance. Indonesia was releasing as much greenhouse gases by destroying rainforest as some of the world’s most developed nations were doing by burning fossil fuels. In the late 2000s, it shot to the top of the list of emitters, below only China and the U.S., solely for this reason. The transfer of community lands to companies owned by oligarchs was symbolic of an assault on marginalized, rural communities with&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2019/05/what-we-learned-from-two-years-of-investigating-corrupt-land-deals-in-indonesia/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-217850</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Vast palm oil project in Papua must be investigated by government, watchdogs say</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/12/vast-palm-oil-project-in-papua-must-be-investigated-by-government-watchdogs-say/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/12/vast-palm-oil-project-in-papua-must-be-investigated-by-government-watchdogs-say/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>06 Dec 2018 10:41:09 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/12/06093352/NNG_4144-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=213151</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Jokowi Commitments]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, New Guinea, Papua, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Carbon Emissions, Climate Change, Corruption, Crime, Deforestation, Environment, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Land Rights, Law Enforcement, Palm Oil, Plantations, Rainforests, Threats To Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[2017-65500, G-1801-55636]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The Indonesian government must put an immediate halt to land clearing in the Tanah Merah project, a vast stretch of land earmarked to become the world’s biggest oil palm plantation, environmental advocates and anti-graft watchdogs say. Spanning 2,800 square kilometers (1,100 square miles), nearly five times the size of Chicago, the land sits at the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The Indonesian government must put an immediate halt to land clearing in the Tanah Merah project, a vast stretch of land earmarked to become the world’s biggest oil palm plantation, environmental advocates and anti-graft watchdogs say. Spanning 2,800 square kilometers (1,100 square miles), nearly five times the size of Chicago, the land sits at the heart of one of the world’s last great tracts of unbroken rainforest, on the giant island of New Guinea. Only 2 percent of the land has been cleared, but if the entire project area is cleared as planned, it will release as much carbon as Virginia does annually by burning fossil fuels. Well-placed observers argue the project is clearly intended to benefit the cabal of wealthy and connected individuals who have coalesced around it, and will fail to deliver development to the indigenous Papuans living in its shadow. They are calling on Indonesian authorities to cancel the licenses underpinning the project, or subject them to special scrutiny as part of an ongoing review of existing permits. The Tanah Merah project was the subject of a joint investigation published last week by Mongabay, The Gecko Project, Tempo and Malaysiakini. The article revealed how the ownership of the project has been concealed by a maze of shell companies, front shareholders, fake addresses and offshore secrecy jurisdictions, making it impossible to tell who will benefit from the destruction of the rainforest in Boven Digoel district, Papua province. Even local government officials are in the dark about who is&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/12/vast-palm-oil-project-in-papua-must-be-investigated-by-government-watchdogs-say/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/12/vast-palm-oil-project-in-papua-must-be-investigated-by-government-watchdogs-say/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-213151</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>A carbon bomb in Papua: 7 takeaways from our investigation</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/12/a-carbon-bomb-in-papua-7-takeaways-from-our-investigation/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/12/a-carbon-bomb-in-papua-7-takeaways-from-our-investigation/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>04 Dec 2018 08:33:47 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/11/28094121/NNG_2433-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=213069</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia for Sale]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, New Guinea, Papua, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Corruption, Crime, Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Forestry, Forests, Law Enforcement, Mongabay investigation, Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[2017-65500, G-1801-55636]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Last week, The Gecko Project, Mongabay, Tempo and Malaysiakini published an investigation into the story behind the Tanah Merah project, a giant oil palm plantation under development in Papua, Indonesia. The article is long, so here are seven key takeaways from it, including a brief analysis of what could happen next: 1. The project poses [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Last week, The Gecko Project, Mongabay, Tempo and Malaysiakini published an investigation into the story behind the Tanah Merah project, a giant oil palm plantation under development in Papua, Indonesia. The article is long, so here are seven key takeaways from it, including a brief analysis of what could happen next: 1. The project poses a greater threat to Indonesia’s forests than any other The project spans 2,800 square kilometers (1,080 square miles), nearly twice the size of greater London. It sits at the heart of the largest tract of virgin forest remaining in Asia. To date, only around 2 percent of the area has been cleared. If the project is completed, it will produce as much greenhouse gas emissions as Virgina does by burning fossil fuels in a single year. 2. The ownership of the project is shrouded in secrecy The investors behind the project have employed all the tools of corporate secrecy to hide their identities: shell companies with front addresses, fake and proxy shareholders, and offshore secrecy jurisdictions. Today the main shareholders in the companies remain obscured. 3. Permits for the project were issued from a prison cell The politician who headed the district at the time of the project’s inception was arrested on unrelated corruption charges at a critical stage of the permit process. We discovered he had signed key documents relating to the project from his prison cell on the island of Java. Anggai village sits on the banks of the Digul River, in the&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/12/a-carbon-bomb-in-papua-7-takeaways-from-our-investigation/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/12/a-carbon-bomb-in-papua-7-takeaways-from-our-investigation/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-213069</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>The secret deal to destroy paradise</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/11/the-secret-deal-to-destroy-paradise/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/11/the-secret-deal-to-destroy-paradise/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>28 Nov 2018 10:56:16 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[MalaysiakiniMongabayTempoThe Gecko Project]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/11/28084741/Earthsight-illustration_FINAL_island-update_2_CMYK-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=212736</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia for Sale]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, Malaysia, New Guinea, Papua, Southeast Asia, and Yemen]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Climate Change, Conservation, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corporate Social Responsibility, Corruption, Crime, Deforestation, Drivers Of Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Forest Carbon, Forest Destruction, Forest Loss, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Land Grabbing, Logging, Mongabay investigation, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Saving Rainforests, Solutions, Traditional People, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[2017-65500, G-1801-55636]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[(Baca dalam Bahasa Indonesia) Prologue: Johor Baru, 2012 In December 2012, at a press conference on the sidelines of an Islamic business forum in Malaysia, a man named Chairul Anhar made a bold claim. His company, he said, held the rights to 4,000 square kilometers of land for oil palm plantations in Indonesia. If true, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[(Baca dalam Bahasa Indonesia) Prologue: Johor Baru, 2012 In December 2012, at a press conference on the sidelines of an Islamic business forum in Malaysia, a man named Chairul Anhar made a bold claim. His company, he said, held the rights to 4,000 square kilometers of land for oil palm plantations in Indonesia. If true, it would make Chairul one of the biggest landowners in the country. That land was not just anywhere, but in New Guinea, a giant island that glittered in the eyes of investors. Shared by Indonesia and Papua New Guinea, the island had the world’s biggest gold mine, untapped oil and gas, and the largest remaining tract of pristine rainforest in Asia. For the companies that had steadily logged their way through the rest of Southeast Asia, New Guinea was the last frontier. For the investor who could tame it, a fortune awaited. Then in his mid-40s, with a stout build, a thin moustache and a buzz cut, Chairul presented himself as such an investor. He claimed to be the president, CEO and owner of a sprawling conglomerate, the Menara Group. He traveled in a Bentley and private jets, and rubbed shoulders with the political elite of Malaysia and his native Indonesia. Chairul Anhar The basis of his claim was the Tanah Merah project, a plan to generate billions of dollars by logging untouched rainforests, home to indigenous tribes and a treasure trove of biodiversity, then razing what remained and replacing it with oil palms. If&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/11/the-secret-deal-to-destroy-paradise/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-212736</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Is Indonesia’s celebrated antigraft agency missing the corruption for the trees?</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/08/is-indonesias-celebrated-antigraft-agency-missing-the-corruption-for-the-trees/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/08/is-indonesias-celebrated-antigraft-agency-missing-the-corruption-for-the-trees/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>22 Aug 2018 03:21:00 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2015/12/03001752/IMG_8822-495x330.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=209519</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia for Sale and Jokowi Commitments]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Southeast Asia, and Sumatra]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Forestry, Forests, Illegal Logging, Land Grabbing, Law Enforcement, Logging, Palm Oil, Plantations, Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[2017-65500, G-1611-55367]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In 2005, an Indonesian election commissioner named Mulyana Kusumah visited a hotel room in Jakarta to hand over 150 million rupiah, then worth more than $15,000, in cash to an official from the state audit board. Mulyana hoped to smooth over a discrepancy auditors had found in the tender process for ballot boxes. But the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In 2005, an Indonesian election commissioner named Mulyana Kusumah visited a hotel room in Jakarta to hand over 150 million rupiah, then worth more than $15,000, in cash to an official from the state audit board. Mulyana hoped to smooth over a discrepancy auditors had found in the tender process for ballot boxes. But the auditor was wearing a wire, while investigators from the nation’s antigraft agency, the KPK, lay in wait. After arresting Mulyana, a KPK team swept the election commission’s offices and found a treasure trove of documents and computer files that would allow them to piece together billions of rupiah in kickbacks, resulting in a spate of high-level convictions. The case served notice that an agency founded just two years prior had arrived with a splash. “Almost every day, the newspaper and television [journalists] wrote about the KPK,” Ary Nugroho, an early KPK adviser, said some years later. “The expectations of the people became bigger and bigger after that case.” The KPK was established in 2003, half a decade after the fall of the dictator Suharto. Its first leaders built the agency from scratch, and after a few short years, wrote Gabriel Kuris, deputy director of the Center for the Advancement of Public Integrity​ at Columbia Law School in New York​, “they had built one of the world’s most effective anti-corruption agencies.” Since then, the number of cases brought by the KPK has grown rapidly, with dozens of politicians, bureaucrats and businesspeople jailed for graft every year.&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/08/is-indonesias-celebrated-antigraft-agency-missing-the-corruption-for-the-trees/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/08/is-indonesias-celebrated-antigraft-agency-missing-the-corruption-for-the-trees/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-209519</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Revealed: Paper giant’s ex-staff say it used their names for secret company in Borneo</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/07/revealed-paper-giants-ex-staff-say-it-used-their-names-for-secret-company-in-borneo/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/07/revealed-paper-giants-ex-staff-say-it-used-their-names-for-secret-company-in-borneo/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>10 Jul 2018 18:03:54 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Philip Jacobson]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2017/03/30124058/sabah_3937-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=208170</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Kalimantan, Southeast Asia, and West Kalimantan]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Crime, Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Law Enforcement, Peatlands, Plantations, Pulp And Paper, Rainforest Destruction, Rainforests, Threats To Rainforests, Transparency, Tropical Forests, and Zero Deforestation Commitments]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[GLO-4060 QZA-16/0047.3, G-1611-55367]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[An investigation by Mongabay has uncovered new evidence suggesting one of the world’s biggest paper producers, Indonesia’s Asia Pulp &#38; Paper, took deliberate measures to disguise its ownership of a controversial company engaged in deforestation. The revelation comes after repeated denials by APP that it owns the company, as its opaque corporate structure has been [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[An investigation by Mongabay has uncovered new evidence suggesting one of the world’s biggest paper producers, Indonesia’s Asia Pulp &amp; Paper, took deliberate measures to disguise its ownership of a controversial company engaged in deforestation. The revelation comes after repeated denials by APP that it owns the company, as its opaque corporate structure has been dragged into the spotlight. Two of APP’s ex-employees interviewed by Mongabay said management had used their names on official filings for the company, PT Muara Sungai Landak, which has been cutting down tropical forest on the island of Borneo to make way for a pulpwood plantation now half the size of Manhattan. One said that he had received a monthly payment to compensate for the arrangement, and that he had been afraid to protest for fear of losing his job. Their accounts, and that of a third ex-employee who provided insight into APP’s inner workings, contradict assertions made in recent months by the paper giant that it has “no relationship” with Muara Sungai Landak. The findings place APP squarely in the middle of an emerging debate about the presence of “shadow companies” among the holdings of the family-owned conglomerates that dominate Indonesia’s plantation sector. Under pressure from civil society groups, many of these business groups have promised to stop deforesting. But it is becoming increasingly clear they are using a variety of methods to conceal their control of troublesome assets. APP belongs to the billionaire Widjaja family, which has investments in a wide range of&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/07/revealed-paper-giants-ex-staff-say-it-used-their-names-for-secret-company-in-borneo/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/07/revealed-paper-giants-ex-staff-say-it-used-their-names-for-secret-company-in-borneo/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-208170</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Palm oil firms using ‘shadow companies’ to hide their links to deforestation: report</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/07/palm-oil-firms-using-shadow-companies-to-hide-their-links-to-deforestation-report/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/07/palm-oil-firms-using-shadow-companies-to-hide-their-links-to-deforestation-report/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>09 Jul 2018 18:15:07 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Daniel Pye]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2016/02/02182353/Aceh-oil-palm-canopy-495x330.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=208154</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Conservation, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corporate Social Responsibility, Corporations, Corruption, Deforestation, Environment, Forestry, Forests, Land Grabbing, Palm Oil, Plantations, Rainforests, Threats To Rainforests, Transparency, Tropical Forests, and Zero Deforestation Commitments]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[G-1611-55367, 2017-65500]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Major agribusiness firms are using opaque corporate structures to gain access to palm oil sourced from plantations operating in violation of their sustainability commitments, according to an investigation into the practice by a leading research group. The report, by risk analysis group Chain Reaction Research (CRR), alleges that large conglomerates in Southeast Asia’s plantation sector [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Major agribusiness firms are using opaque corporate structures to gain access to palm oil sourced from plantations operating in violation of their sustainability commitments, according to an investigation into the practice by a leading research group. The report, by risk analysis group Chain Reaction Research (CRR), alleges that large conglomerates in Southeast Asia’s plantation sector often deliberately hide the true ownership of controversial assets without relinquishing control. As a result, deforestation takes place at plantations that belong to the same ultimate owners as firms that subscribe to No Deforestation, No Peat, No Exploitation (NDPE) sourcing policies. These firms have promised to refrain from clearing forest and peatland, grabbing land from rural communities, and abusing their laborers. Under pressure from civil society groups, large corporations up and down the palm oil supply chain began to issue NDPE policies five years ago. But to avoid losing control of assets found to be in breach of these policies, palm oil firms established side businesses controlled by family members and sold off assets to related parties in a bid to cover their tracks, the report alleges. “The biggest issue for us is to stop deforestation. We are particularly concerned about this ‘shadow company’ issue as it really threatens NDPE policies, by allowing growers to continue to deforest, and allowing them to still find a market with companies with NDPE policies,” Chris Wiggs, a consultant with Aidenvironment, a partner organization of CRR, told Mongabay. The biggest palm oil traders, he said, “have so far appeared&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/07/palm-oil-firms-using-shadow-companies-to-hide-their-links-to-deforestation-report/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-208154</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Abdon Nababan: ‘North Sumatran land mafia offered me $21m to win election — and then hand over control of government’</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/06/abdon-nababan-north-sumatran-land-mafia-offered-me-21m-to-win-election-and-then-hand-over-control-of-government/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/06/abdon-nababan-north-sumatran-land-mafia-offered-me-21m-to-win-election-and-then-hand-over-control-of-government/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>21 Jun 2018 12:33:14 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/06/21110551/2018_05_24-Abdon-portrait-3-resized-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=207601</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia for Sale and Jokowi Commitments]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, North Sumatra, Southeast Asia, and Sumatra]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Activism, Anonymous Companies, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Crime, Environment, Environmental Policy, Governance, Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Rights, Land Use Change, Law Enforcement, Organized Crime, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, and Transparency]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[2017-65500, G-1611-55367]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In July last year, Abdon Nababan, one of Indonesia’s most prominent activists, announced his intention to run for governor in his home province of North Sumatra. During his decade-long tenure as head of AMAN, the country’s main advocacy group for indigenous rights, Abdon led the organization to a series of high-profile wins. These included a [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In July last year, Abdon Nababan, one of Indonesia’s most prominent activists, announced his intention to run for governor in his home province of North Sumatra. During his decade-long tenure as head of AMAN, the country’s main advocacy group for indigenous rights, Abdon led the organization to a series of high-profile wins. These included a landmark court decision that eroded the state’s legal claim to indigenous peoples’ territories, which have widely been leased out to agribusiness and extractive companies by corrupt politicians. North Sumatra is no exception: Its last two governors were convicted of graft. North Sumatra, home to nearly 14 million people, is a bastion of the indigenous rights movement, and in many respects Abdon was an ideal candidate — politically connected, charismatic, an experienced campaigner, social-media savvy, and a political outsider and reformer in the mold of current President Joko Widodo. The vote for governor will take place later this month, but Abdon didn’t make it onto the ballot. Instead, the election will be contested by two candidates representing the more familiar faces of Indonesian politics. One of the them is a retired army general, while the other is running alongside a wealthy palm oil baron. The fact that Abdon couldn’t stand reflects a phenomenon Mongabay and The Gecko Project have been investigating over the past 18 months: the role of money in elections, and its connection to destructive business interests that have established a stranglehold over politics in much of Indonesia, a young democracy still recovering from&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/06/abdon-nababan-north-sumatran-land-mafia-offered-me-21m-to-win-election-and-then-hand-over-control-of-government/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-207601</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>How corrupt elections fuel the sell-off of Indonesia’s natural resources</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/06/how-corrupt-elections-fuel-the-sell-off-of-indonesias-natural-resources/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/06/how-corrupt-elections-fuel-the-sell-off-of-indonesias-natural-resources/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>07 Jun 2018 02:17:56 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2017/11/11052613/IMG_2059-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=207274</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia for Sale and Jokowi Commitments]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Southeast Asia, and Sumatra]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Climate Change, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Crime, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Land Conflict, Law Enforcement, Mining, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[2017-65500, G-1611-55367]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In June this year, elections will take place in 171 districts, provinces and municipalities across Indonesia. On paper, millions of citizens in the world’s third-largest democracy will be afforded the right to select leaders with extensive powers over their everyday lives. In practice, however, most will be offered a choice between candidates already hopelessly in [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In June this year, elections will take place in 171 districts, provinces and municipalities across Indonesia. On paper, millions of citizens in the world’s third-largest democracy will be afforded the right to select leaders with extensive powers over their everyday lives. In practice, however, most will be offered a choice between candidates already hopelessly in hock to secretive corporate interests. Many citizens will unknowingly vote for politicians backed by companies that have violated their human rights and caused irrevocable harm to the environment. The undue influence afforded corporations through campaign financing is a global problem. From fragile states in West Africa to the more mature democracy of the United States, government decision-making is warped by relationships politicians forge with private-sector donors. In the two decades since the beginning of Indonesia’s democratic project, this phenomenon has become entrenched, systemic, and underpins some of the most serious challenges facing the Southeast Asian country. Recognizing how political and corporate interests converge is key to understanding why so little progress has been made toward solving two of Indonesia’s most egregious problems: the destruction of its environment, and the proliferation of conflicts over land and resources. These twin crises appear intractable largely because of the hold that corporations exercise over regional politicians, and the mutually beneficial relationships between them. It begins with elections. Rise and scale of money politics Indonesia’s transition to democracy began with the 1998 fall of the military dictator Suharto, who exercised a highly centralized and ruthless control over the country, its&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/06/how-corrupt-elections-fuel-the-sell-off-of-indonesias-natural-resources/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/06/how-corrupt-elections-fuel-the-sell-off-of-indonesias-natural-resources/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-207274</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Paper giant denies secretly owning ‘independent’ suppliers</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/06/paper-giant-denies-secretly-owning-independent-suppliers/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/06/paper-giant-denies-secretly-owning-independent-suppliers/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>05 Jun 2018 12:58:54 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2016/02/02182324/riau_0983-495x330.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=207234</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Jokowi Commitments]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Southeast Asia, and Sumatra]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Deforestation, Environment, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Peatlands, Rainforests, Transparency, Tropical Forests, and Zero Deforestation Commitments]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[G-1611-55367]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[One of the world’s biggest paper producers continues to deny that it secretly owns most of the companies supplying it with wood, despite mounting evidence to the contrary. In the latest exposé of the corporate structure of Sinarmas, which is controlled by Indonesia’s billionaire Widjaja family, a coalition of NGOs last week mapped out the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[One of the world’s biggest paper producers continues to deny that it secretly owns most of the companies supplying it with wood, despite mounting evidence to the contrary. In the latest exposé of the corporate structure of Sinarmas, which is controlled by Indonesia’s billionaire Widjaja family, a coalition of NGOs last week mapped out the precise links between the conglomerate and its wood suppliers, first outed in broader terms last December by The Associated Press. The NGO report — titled “Removing the Corporate Mask” — says dozens of individuals who “appear to be current or past employees” of Sinarmas and its Asia Pulp &amp; Paper arm are also listed as directors, commissioners and shareholders of the supplier companies. For years observers have speculated that Sinarmas has closer ties to its wood suppliers than it lets on. One motive for obscuring the alleged ownership links could be to deflect blame for the fires that burn annually across Indonesia’s vast peat swamp zones, sending toxic haze into neighboring countries. Plantation companies are often blamed for causing the fires, since they drain swampy land on a massive scale in order to prepare it for planting. This practice renders the peat highly flammable, creating the conditions for fire to spread. Asia Pulp &amp; Paper’s 33 declared suppliers in Indonesia control an area larger than Vermont. Much of this land burned in 2015, during one of the worst bouts of haze in recent memory. After a pair of Asia Pulp &amp; Paper suppliers had their&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/06/paper-giant-denies-secretly-owning-independent-suppliers/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/06/paper-giant-denies-secretly-owning-independent-suppliers/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-207234</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>It’s time to confront the collusion between the palm oil industry and politicians that is driving Indonesia’s deforestation crisis (commentary)</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/its-time-to-confront-the-collusion-between-the-palm-oil-industry-and-politicians-that-is-driving-indonesias-deforestation-crisis-commentary/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/its-time-to-confront-the-collusion-between-the-palm-oil-industry-and-politicians-that-is-driving-indonesias-deforestation-crisis-commentary/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Apr 2018 07:13:05 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Tom Johnson]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/04/17121707/1_2Cjap063MH9jVM_18EaqBQ-768x512.jpeg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=205867</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia for Sale]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Commentary, Corruption, Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, Rainforests, Threats To Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Two decades on from the fall of the Suharto dictatorship, Indonesia’s transition to democracy is regarded as a global success story. But lurking beneath the surface is an ugly truth. A now irrefutable body of evidence shows that regional elections, for the town mayors, district chiefs and provincial governors who hold huge sway over the [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Two decades on from the fall of the Suharto dictatorship, Indonesia’s transition to democracy is regarded as a global success story. But lurking beneath the surface is an ugly truth. A now irrefutable body of evidence shows that regional elections, for the town mayors, district chiefs and provincial governors who hold huge sway over the lives of citizens in a decentralized state, are overwhelmingly corrupted by dark money. Political scientists, civil society observers and enforcement agencies have documented the race to the bottom as candidates compete to outspend one another, employing an array of nefarious and illegal methods collectively referred to as “money politics.” Indonesia Corruption Watch, a non-profit that monitors elections across the country, has described regional elections as “brutal and shambolic.” Many informed observers believe the phenomenon is growing worse. This system pushes to the top of the pile the candidates with the greatest tolerance for the dark arts of money politics and the ability to find wealthy backers. A study released earlier this year by the KPK, Indonesia’s anti-graft agency, found the majority of candidates are forced to make Faustian bargains with private interests to generate the funds required to mount a serious challenge. The donors want something in return: government contracts, jobs, policy influence and, above all, business licenses. Across much of rural Indonesia, the most valuable commodity these corrupt politicians have to offer is land. The largest demand for that land, meanwhile, is for the development of giant plantations. Predominantly to produce palm oil, a&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/its-time-to-confront-the-collusion-between-the-palm-oil-industry-and-politicians-that-is-driving-indonesias-deforestation-crisis-commentary/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/its-time-to-confront-the-collusion-between-the-palm-oil-industry-and-politicians-that-is-driving-indonesias-deforestation-crisis-commentary/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-205867</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Ghosts in the machine: the land deals behind the downfall of Indonesia&#8217;s top judge</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/ghosts-in-the-machine-the-land-deals-behind-the-downfall-of-indonesias-top-judge/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/ghosts-in-the-machine-the-land-deals-behind-the-downfall-of-indonesias-top-judge/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>18 Apr 2018 06:06:37 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/04/17100645/illustration_revised3-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=205715</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia for Sale]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Forestry, Forests, Indigenous Peoples, Land Conflict, Land Grabbing, Land Rights, Land Use Change, Logging, Mongabay investigation, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, Rainforests, Threats To Rainforests, and Transparency]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[2017-65500, G-1611-55367]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[(Baca dalam Bahasa Indonesia.) Prologue: Jakarta, 2013 It was long after the close of business when Indonesia’s highest-ranking judge stepped out of his official residence in Jakarta to greet some guests, one night in October 2013. It had been a busy few months for Akil Mochtar. In his capacity as chief justice of the Constitutional Court, he [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[(Baca dalam Bahasa Indonesia.) Prologue: Jakarta, 2013 It was long after the close of business when Indonesia’s highest-ranking judge stepped out of his official residence in Jakarta to greet some guests, one night in October 2013. It had been a busy few months for Akil Mochtar. In his capacity as chief justice of the Constitutional Court, he had been called upon to preside over a flurry of cases brought by candidates who had recently taken part in regional elections. Those who felt they had been cheated out of victory through bribes, vote tampering or any of a number of ruses used to gain an edge in close-fought contests could challenge the result in Akil’s court. Akil was working late because he had a lucrative side job. By day he fulfilled his official role, running one of the nation’s most trusted institutions while presenting the face of an impartial judge. By night he peddled his verdicts, negotiating with litigants who sought to buy his decisions for cash. Akil had become a part of the corrupt system he was supposed to police. Waiting for Akil, sitting on a bench next to the manicured bushes on his terrace, was a businessman with four envelopes underneath his shirt stuffed with a total of $250,000 in U.S. and Singapore currency. He was accompanied by an austere woman wearing a hijab and spectacles, a member of parliament who had brokered the deal about to go down. But as soon as Akil stepped out of his front door, more&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/ghosts-in-the-machine-the-land-deals-behind-the-downfall-of-indonesias-top-judge/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-205715</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>How a family of local elites is still pitching to control a district in Borneo</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/how-a-family-of-local-elites-is-still-pitching-to-control-a-district-in-borneo/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/how-a-family-of-local-elites-is-still-pitching-to-control-a-district-in-borneo/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>11 Apr 2018 23:29:04 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/04/11232725/GP-9324-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=205711</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Corruption, Environment, Environmental Law, Environmental Policy, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Politics, Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In the leadup to the release of the second installment of Indonesia for Sale, our series examining the corruption behind Indonesia’s deforestation and land-rights crisis, we are republishing the first article in the series, “The Palm Oil Fiefdom.”  This is the seventh and final part of that article. The first part described a secret deal between the son of [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In the leadup to the release of the second installment of Indonesia for Sale, our series examining the corruption behind Indonesia’s deforestation and land-rights crisis, we are republishing the first article in the series, “The Palm Oil Fiefdom.”  This is the seventh and final part of that article. The first part described a secret deal between the son of Darwan Ali, head of Indonesia’s Seruyan district, and Arif Rachmat, CEO of one of Indonesia’s largest palm oil companies. The second part gave Darwan’s backstory, and the third part chronicled the palm oil boom that hit Seruyan after he took office. The fourth part examined the corruption behind that boom. The fifth part focused on Seruyan’s people as they organized against Darwan. The sixth part asked why he was never prosecuted.  The article can be read in full here. Indonesia for Sale is co-produced with The Gecko Project, an initiative of the UK-based investigations house Earthsight. Cover image for &#8216;The Palm Oil Fiefdom.&#8217; Despite his son Ruswandi’s defeat in the 2013 election, Darwan Ali’s family remained embedded in the political establishment in both Seruyan and Central Kalimantan province. Darwan moved to a new political party, which he now chairs at the provincial level. It is an influential position for trading support in elections. Last year, he used it to back the current governor, the nephew of a timber baron who plundered Tanjung Puting National Park, for a second term. Darwan did not respond to multiple interview requests, delivered via text messages and calls to a number provided by his party’s office at the House of Representatives in&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/how-a-family-of-local-elites-is-still-pitching-to-control-a-district-in-borneo/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/how-a-family-of-local-elites-is-still-pitching-to-control-a-district-in-borneo/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-205711</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indonesian billionaire using &#8216;shadow companies&#8217; to clear forest for palm oil, report alleges</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/indonesian-billionaire-using-shadow-companies-to-clear-forest-for-palm-oil-report-alleges/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/indonesian-billionaire-using-shadow-companies-to-clear-forest-for-palm-oil-report-alleges/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>11 Apr 2018 11:13:03 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Daniel Pye]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/04/11105307/kalteng_0910-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=205659</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Southeast Asia, and West Kalimantan]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Banking, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Deforestation, Environment, Environmental Policy, Finance, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Palm Oil, Peatlands, Plantations, Rainforests, Threats To Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
											<grant>
							<![CDATA[2017-65500, G-1611-55367, GLO-4060 QZA-16/0047.3]]>
						</grant>
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The owner of Indonesia’s largest conglomerate has been accused of participating in the illegal deforestation of Borneo’s Ketungau peat swamp to make way for oil palm plantations. The Salim Group, owned by tycoon Anthoni Salim, Indonesia’s fourth-richest man according to Forbes, is reportedly linked either by ownership or association with the two companies that cleared [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The owner of Indonesia’s largest conglomerate has been accused of participating in the illegal deforestation of Borneo’s Ketungau peat swamp to make way for oil palm plantations. The Salim Group, owned by tycoon Anthoni Salim, Indonesia’s fourth-richest man according to Forbes, is reportedly linked either by ownership or association with the two companies that cleared nearly 10,000 hectares of the protected rainforest. The Salim Group notably includes Indofood, a joint-venture partner with major brands such as PepsiCo and Nestle, as well as First Pacific, the joint owner of Goodman Fielder, a leading food producer in the Asia-Pacific region. In a new report released today, Aidenvironment, a sustainability consultancy, said that the Salim Group’s continuing reliance on “shadow companies” to sidestep legal oversight also raised questions over the complicity of major banks, such as Citibank, Mizuho, Standard Chartered, BNP Paribas and Rabobank, that finance the Salim Group. “This report provides clear evidence of shady business dealings and inaction at the highest levels of business, all while tropical rainforests continue to fall for Conflict Palm Oil,” said Gemma Tillack, forest policy director of Rainforest Action Network (RAN), which commissioned the research along with Rainforest Foundation Norway (RFN) and SumOfUs. The report, titled “Palm oil sustainability assessment of Salim-related companies in Borneo peat forests”, also alleged that The Salim Group was made aware of the deforestation carried out by PT Duta Rendra Mulya — majority owned by Anthoni Salim — and PT Sawit Khatulistiwa Lestari — linked with the tycoon through business associates&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/indonesian-billionaire-using-shadow-companies-to-clear-forest-for-palm-oil-report-alleges/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-205659</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>How loopholes in Indonesia&#8217;s corruption law let environmental crime persist</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/how-loopholes-in-indonesias-corruption-law-lets-environmental-crime-persist/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/how-loopholes-in-indonesias-corruption-law-lets-environmental-crime-persist/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>09 Apr 2018 00:31:51 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/04/09002048/GP-8367-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=205587</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Corruption, Environment, Environmental Law, Forestry, Forests, Governance, Law Enforcement, Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In the leadup to the release of the second installment of Indonesia for Sale, our series examining the corruption behind Indonesia’s deforestation and land-rights crisis, we are republishing the first article in the series, “The Palm Oil Fiefdom.”  This is the fifth part of that article. The first part described a secret deal between the son of Darwan Ali, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In the leadup to the release of the second installment of Indonesia for Sale, our series examining the corruption behind Indonesia’s deforestation and land-rights crisis, we are republishing the first article in the series, “The Palm Oil Fiefdom.”  This is the fifth part of that article. The first part described a secret deal between the son of Darwan Ali, head of Indonesia’s Seruyan district, and Arif Rachmat, CEO of one of Indonesia’s largest palm oil companies. The second part gave Darwan’s backstory, and the third part chronicled the palm oil boom that hit Seruyan after he took office. The fourth part examined the corruption behind that boom. The fifth part focused on Seruyan&#8217;s people as they organized against Darwan. The article can be read in full here. Indonesia for Sale is co-produced with The Gecko Project, an initiative of the UK-based investigations house Earthsight. The cover image for &#8216;The Palm Oil Fiefdom.&#8217; To the handful of observers who were aware of what Darwan had done, it was clear that he had abused his office to make money for his family, while inflicting considerable harm on the people he was elected to serve. The KPK investigators circled around the case for years, so why didn’t they pounce? The investigators involved, who have all since left the agency, were either unwilling or unable to comment for this article. We sought answers through interviews with current KPK officials, NGOs and academics focusing on anticorruption efforts in Indonesia, and our own research on other KPK cases. The easiest way to prosecute a corrupt official under Indonesian law is&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/how-loopholes-in-indonesias-corruption-law-lets-environmental-crime-persist/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/how-loopholes-in-indonesias-corruption-law-lets-environmental-crime-persist/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-205587</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>How the farmers of Seruyan rose up a against a palm oil fiefdom</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/how-the-farmers-of-seruyan-rose-up-a-against-a-palm-oil-fiefdom/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/how-the-farmers-of-seruyan-rose-up-a-against-a-palm-oil-fiefdom/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>05 Apr 2018 08:21:43 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2018/04/05082629/GP-8342-1-768x512.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=205517</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Crime, Environment, Farming, Forestry, Forests, Land Grabbing, Land Rights, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, Threats To Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In the leadup to the release of the second installment of Indonesia for Sale, our series examining the corruption behind Indonesia’s deforestation and land-rights crisis, we are republishing the first article in the series, “The Palm Oil Fiefdom.”  This is the fourth part of that article. The first part described a secret deal between the son of Darwan Ali, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In the leadup to the release of the second installment of Indonesia for Sale, our series examining the corruption behind Indonesia’s deforestation and land-rights crisis, we are republishing the first article in the series, “The Palm Oil Fiefdom.”  This is the fourth part of that article. The first part described a secret deal between the son of Darwan Ali, head of Indonesia’s Seruyan district, and Arif Rachmat, CEO of one of Indonesia’s largest palm oil companies. The second part gave Darwan’s backstory, and the third part chronicled the palm oil boom that hit Seruyan after he took office. The fourth part examined the corruption behind that boom. The article can be read in full here. Indonesia for Sale is co-produced with The Gecko Project, an initiative of the UK-based investigations house Earthsight. The cover image for &#8216;The Palm Oil Fiefdom.&#8217; One night during Darwan’s second term, a farmer named Marjuansyah, who lived in the village the bupati had grown up in, had an unsettling encounter with the police. For two years he had nursed a small patch of oil palm east of Lake Sembuluh, and hundreds of saplings were now close to bearing fruit. But his land also fell within an area licensed to one of the companies Darwan’s son Ruswandi had sold to Triputra. The police told Marjuansyah that they had come on company business. Triputra, they said, would pay him 5 million rupiah, around $550, for each of his nine hectares. The cash would not last long, while the palms he had cultivated could provide him an income for the&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/04/how-the-farmers-of-seruyan-rose-up-a-against-a-palm-oil-fiefdom/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-205517</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>How a series of shady deals turned a chunk of Borneo into a sea of oil palm</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/03/how-a-series-of-shady-deals-turned-a-chunk-of-borneo-into-a-sea-of-oil-palm/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/03/how-a-series-of-shady-deals-turned-a-chunk-of-borneo-into-a-sea-of-oil-palm/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>27 Mar 2018 21:32:17 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[The Gecko Project and Mongabay]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2016/02/02182353/Aceh-oil-palm-canopy-495x330.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=205234</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Crime, Environment, Forestry, Forests, Palm Oil, Plantations, Politics, Threats To Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[In the leadup to the release of the second installment of Indonesia for Sale, our series examining the corruption behind Indonesia’s deforestation and land-rights crisis, we are republishing the first article in the series, “The Palm Oil Fiefdom.”  This is the fourth part of that article. The first part described a secret deal between the son of Darwan Ali, [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[In the leadup to the release of the second installment of Indonesia for Sale, our series examining the corruption behind Indonesia’s deforestation and land-rights crisis, we are republishing the first article in the series, “The Palm Oil Fiefdom.”  This is the fourth part of that article. The first part described a secret deal between the son of Darwan Ali, head of Indonesia’s Seruyan district, and Arif Rachmat, CEO of one of Indonesia’s largest palm oil companies. The second part gave Darwan’s backstory. The third part chronicled Seruyan&#8217;s plantation boom. The story can be read in full here. Indonesia for Sale is co-produced with The Gecko Project, an initiative of the UK-based investigations house Earthsight. Cover image for &#8216;The Palm Oil Fiefdom.&#8217; One day in early 2007, a car rolled up outside the home of Marianto Sumarto, the sawmill owner who had helped Darwan Ali get elected. He lived in Kuala Pembuang, a small coastal town that serves as Seruyan’s capital. Marianto recognized the man behind the wheel as a government official, as he rolled down the window to hand over a bundle of papers. “Take a look at these  —  there are some issues,” the man said flatly, before driving off. When Marianto examined the dossier, he found copies of plantation permits Darwan had given to a handful of companies, with a list of directors and company addresses. He immediately recognized the names of some of Darwan’s relatives. Among the addresses, he noted the Kuala Pembuang home of Darwan’s brother. “I don’t know why he brought me that data,” Marianto told us&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2018/03/how-a-series-of-shady-deals-turned-a-chunk-of-borneo-into-a-sea-of-oil-palm/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
										<wfw:commentRss>https://news.mongabay.com/2018/03/how-a-series-of-shady-deals-turned-a-chunk-of-borneo-into-a-sea-of-oil-palm/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-205234</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Paper giant and its ‘suppliers’ are essentially one and the same, investigation finds</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/12/paper-giant-and-its-suppliers-are-essentially-one-and-the-same-investigation-finds/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/12/paper-giant-and-its-suppliers-are-essentially-one-and-the-same-investigation-finds/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>26 Dec 2017 18:06:00 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Michael Disabato]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2016/03/01221652/Peatland-drained-acacia-riau-495x330.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=202465</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Southeast Asia, and Sumatra]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Plantations, Pulp And Paper, and Transparency]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[An investigation by The Associated Press has uncovered ownership ties between one of the world’s largest paper producers and more than two dozen tree-plantation companies linked to devastating fires and deforestation in Indonesia. The news agency used hundreds of pages of corporate records to determine that Asia Pulp &#38; Paper (APP) – an arm of [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[An investigation by The Associated Press has uncovered ownership ties between one of the world’s largest paper producers and more than two dozen tree-plantation companies linked to devastating fires and deforestation in Indonesia. The news agency used hundreds of pages of corporate records to determine that Asia Pulp &amp; Paper (APP) – an arm of the family-run Sinar Mas conglomerate – has “extensive behind-the-scenes ties and significant influence” over a vast network of suppliers that the paper giant had consistently asserted were independent entities. Twenty-five of APP’s suppliers were found to be owned by 10 individuals, including six current and two former employees of the conglomerate, several of whom work in its finance department. The suppliers are controlled, according to an article published by the news agency last week, “through layers of shareholding companies that are almost always based in Sinarmas offices and in most cases have Sinarmas employees, ranging from top executives to humble IT workers and accountants, as their directors and commissioners” – some of whom are descendants of 96-year-old Sinar Mas founder Eka Tjipta Wijaja, whose billionaire family still owns the conglomerate. The Associated Press even found an internal Sinar Mas document describing its own “significant influence” over an unspecified number of its suppliers through long-term purchasing agreements, loans, asset and service transfers, and trades lacking financial justification. “The full picture of what benefits Sinarmas obtains by obscuring the true extent of its ties to the plantation companies is unclear,” the news agency wrote, in possible allusion to&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2017/12/paper-giant-and-its-suppliers-are-essentially-one-and-the-same-investigation-finds/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-202465</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indonesian agribusiness giant APRIL outed in Paradise Papers</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/11/indonesian-agribusiness-giant-april-outed-in-paradise-papers/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/11/indonesian-agribusiness-giant-april-outed-in-paradise-papers/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>13 Nov 2017 20:51:45 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2016/03/01221652/Peatland-drained-acacia-riau-495x330.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=201130</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Borneo, Indonesia, Southeast Asia, and Sumatra]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Corruption, Deforestation, Environment, Forestry, Forests, Journalism, Plantations, Rainforests, Transparency, Tropical Forests, and Zero Deforestation Commitments]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia’s second-largest pulp and paper firm routed billions of dollars through a network of offshore shell companies, likely to minimize its tax burden in the Southeast Asian country, where it has drained vast swaths of carbon-rich peatland in order to establish vast timber estates. The company, APRIL, also sought the removal of an environmental condition [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[Indonesia’s second-largest pulp and paper firm routed billions of dollars through a network of offshore shell companies, likely to minimize its tax burden in the Southeast Asian country, where it has drained vast swaths of carbon-rich peatland in order to establish vast timber estates. The company, APRIL, also sought the removal of an environmental condition from a $600 million loan it received from major banks in 2011. The revelations were published last week by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) as part of its reporting on the Paradise Papers, a leak of 13.4 million files that shine new light on how the world’s richest individuals and corporations hide their wealth in secrecy jurisdictions. Most of the documents come from the Bermuda-based law firm Appleby. They were leaked to a pair of reporters at the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung and then shared with the ICIJ and its media partners around the world. &#8220;[APRIL] has shuffled billions of dollars through a web of offshore companies stretching from the Cook Islands in the South Pacific to the British Virgin Islands in the Caribbean. &#8230; Experts told ICIJ that such arrangements often shift taxable profits away from jurisdictions that bear the social costs of resource exploitation to others that simply charge lower taxes,&#8221; the article reads. &#8220;They also said that the use of shell companies in loan transactions enables banks to claim only limited involvement with natural resources companies that flout environmental laws. When loans are provided to offshore subsidiaries, identifying responsible parties&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2017/11/indonesian-agribusiness-giant-april-outed-in-paradise-papers/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-201130</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>Indonesian government challenges another green group over freedom of information request</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/01/indonesian-government-challenges-another-green-group-over-freedom-of-information-request/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2017/01/indonesian-government-challenges-another-green-group-over-freedom-of-information-request/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>17 Jan 2017 13:38:46 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Mongabay.com]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2015/09/03164107/aceh_0797-495x330.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=192483</guid>

											<reporting-project>
							<![CDATA[Jokowi Commitments]]>
						</reporting-project>
					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Activism, Anonymous Companies, Crime, Environment, Environmental Policy, Forestry, Forests, Freedom of Information, Governance, Palm Oil, Plantations, Rainforests, Transparency, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[The Indonesian government is going to the Supreme Court over an NGO’s freedom of information request for detailed maps of land on which oil palm companies have been licensed to operate in Kalimantan, the country’s portion of Borneo island. Civil society groups have tried for years to pry away the maps, said to be crucial [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[The Indonesian government is going to the Supreme Court over an NGO’s freedom of information request for detailed maps of land on which oil palm companies have been licensed to operate in Kalimantan, the country’s portion of Borneo island. Civil society groups have tried for years to pry away the maps, said to be crucial if the public is to effectively monitor an industry rife with illegality. Oil palm plantation firms routinely clear outside of their permitted areas, destroying forests and community lands with little oversight from local officials. The lack of clarity over who has been authorized to operate in precisely which areas can play into the hands of companies who dismiss watchdog allegations as based on faulty data. “We as members of the public want to participate” in the nation&#8217;s governance of its natural resources, said Linda Rosalina, a campaigner with Forest Watch Indonesia (FWI), the group behind the request. “There is no reason for the ministry to keep these documents under wraps,” she said. The Ministry of Land and Spatial Planning says otherwise. While it concedes that sharing the boundaries, coordinates and area of a company&#8217;s concession presents no problem, it continues to argue that releasing the permit holder&#8217;s name is a violation of the firm&#8217;s privacy. “It cannot be disclosed except for the purposes of [official] investigation and deed checking,” ministry spokesperson Virgo Eresta Jaya told Mongabay. FWI disagrees, arguing that maps without concessionaires&#8217; names &#8220;make it difficult to identify companies that overlap or come into conflict with community land,&#8221; according&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2017/01/indonesian-government-challenges-another-green-group-over-freedom-of-information-request/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-192483</doi>				</item>
						<item>
					<title>These banks are pumping billions into Southeast Asia&#8217;s deforestation</title>
					<link>https://news.mongabay.com/2016/09/these-banks-are-pumping-billions-into-southeast-asias-deforestation/</link>
					<comments>https://news.mongabay.com/2016/09/these-banks-are-pumping-billions-into-southeast-asias-deforestation/#respond</comments>
					<pubDate>08 Sep 2016 17:38:04 +0000</pubDate>
											<dc:creator>
							<![CDATA[Alice Cuddy]]>
						</dc:creator>
										<author>
						<![CDATA[Mongabay Editor]]>
					</author>
							<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
										<enclosure url="https://imgs.mongabay.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2015/11/03132312/Deforestation-in-Borneo-495x330.jpg" type="image/jpeg" />
					<guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.mongabay.com/?p=189167</guid>

					
											<locations>
							<![CDATA[Asia, China, Europe, Global, Indonesia, Malaysia, Southeast Asia, and United States]]>
						</locations>
					
											<topic-tags>
							<![CDATA[Anonymous Companies, Banking, Corporate Environmental Transgressors, Deforestation, Economics, Environment, Environmental Policy, Finance, Forestry, Forests, Palm Oil, Pulp And Paper, Rainforests, Solutions, Threats To Rainforests, and Tropical Forests]]>
						</topic-tags>
					
					
											<description>
							<![CDATA[A new online database is shining light on the big banks and investors funding forest-risk sector companies operating in Southeast Asia, with financiers in Malaysia, China and Europe among the biggest backers, and many lacking adequate safeguards to ensure the money they hand over does not prove destructive. The database, which was launched this week by [&#8230;]]]>
						</description>
																					<content:encoded>
							<![CDATA[A new online database is shining light on the big banks and investors funding forest-risk sector companies operating in Southeast Asia, with financiers in Malaysia, China and Europe among the biggest backers, and many lacking adequate safeguards to ensure the money they hand over does not prove destructive. The database, which was launched this week by a coalition of campaign and research organizations including Rainforest Action Network (RAN) and Profundo, uses financial data from Thomson EIKON and Bloomberg, as well as publicly available company reports, to identify corporate loans, credit and underwriting facilities provided to 50 selected companies in 2010-2015. The database is “essentially an effort to bring more transparency and accountability” to forest-risk sector funding, said Tom Picken, RAN’s Forests and Finance campaign director. “We hope it is useful [in enabling] researchers, campaigners and activists to more easily identify financier-client relationships,” he explained, adding that members of the “responsible investment community” had also showed an interest in analyzing the data, which will be updated quarterly. Deforestation in Borneo. Photo by Rhett A. Butler. According to the data, banks and investors in Malaysia are the biggest financiers of the selected forest-risk companies, with a particular focus on palm oil. The total amount in loans and underwriting recorded from Malaysia is $7.73 billion. Financiers in China, meanwhile, are shown to have provided $6.21 billion to pulp and paper, rubber, and palm oil companies, while those in the U.S. and Europe are also linked to significant investments in forest-risk sectors. Image courtesy of&hellip;This article was originally published on <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2016/09/these-banks-are-pumping-billions-into-southeast-asias-deforestation/" data-wpel-link="internal">Mongabay</a>]]>
						</content:encoded>
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					<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
										<doi>https://doi.org/10.66709/news-189167</doi>				</item>
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