Indonesia hits European Union with WTO lawsuit over palm oil

Yahoo – AFP, December 16, 2019

Indonesia has accused the European Union of discrimination against its palm
oil exports (AFP Photo/Mohd RASFAN)

Indonesia has filed a World Trade Organization lawsuit against the European Union over plans to phase out palm oil-based biofuel for cars, the trade ministry said.

The action could escalate a trade dispute between Indonesia -- the world's top palm oil producer - and the EU, which plans to end its use of biofuels by 2030, citing concerns over widespread deforestation caused by the sector.

The EU earlier imposed duties on imports of subsidised biodiesel from Indonesia saying it was needed to level the playing field for its producers.

In response to what it called "discriminative" policies against its key palm oil exports, Indonesia said it filed a complaint with the WTO last week.

"Indonesia officially sent a request for consultation on December 9, 2019 to the EU as the initial step for the lawsuit," Trade Minister Agus Suparmanto said in a statement Sunday.

Neighbouring Malaysia, the world's second-biggest palm oil producer, has also threatened WTO action against the EU.

Teresa Kok, the minister overseeing Malaysia's palm oil sector, told AFP on Monday that she will head to Europe in March, and a challenge will not be filed until after then.

She said she wanted to try to convince European officials to change course on her trip.

"I want to give my trip a chance and see whether I can avoid filing the case at the WTO," she added.

Palm oil is the world's most widely used vegetable oil and a key ingredient in a wide range of products from food to cosmetics.

But environmentalists say it drives deforestation, with huge swathes of Southeast Asian rainforest logged in recent decades to make way for palm plantations.

Iman Pambagyo, Indonesia's director general for international trade negotiations, said Jakarta had previously tried other bilateral avenues to reach an agreement, without success.

"We need to assert Indonesia's stance on EU policy," Pambagyo said, referring to the WTO complaint, and adding that he hoped for a "best solution".

Indonesia arrests nearly 200 over raging forest fires

Yahoo – AFP, September 16, 2019

The fires -- usually started by illegal burning to clear land for farming -- have
unleashed choking haze across Southeast Asia (AFP Photo/ADEK BERRY)

Indonesia has arrested nearly 200 people over vast forest fires ripping across the archipelago, police said Monday, as toxic haze sends air quality levels plummeting and sparks flight cancellations.

Jakarta has deployed thousands of personnel to battle blazes that are turning land into charred landscapes and consuming forests in Sumatra and Borneo islands, where thousands of schools have been shut over health fears.

The fires -- usually started by illegal burning to clear land for farming -- have unleashed choking haze across Southeast Asia, triggering diplomatic tensions with Indonesia's neighbours.

On Monday, authorities said they had arrested some 185 people suspected of being involved in activities that led to out-of-control fires sweeping the country.

"Indonesian Police will enforce the law against anyone who is proven to have carried out forest and land burning, whether it was done intentionally or through negligence," National Police spokesman Dedi Prasetyo told reporters in Jakarta.

Indonesia's peat fires: a smouldering problem (AFP Photo/John SAEKI)

"This is a last resort. The most important thing is prevention."

Four corporations were also being investigated, he added.

Last week, Indonesia sealed off dozens of plantations where smog-belching fires were blazing, and warned that owners -- including Malaysia and Singapore-based firms -- could face criminal charges if there was evidence of illegal burning.

Some of the most serious fires occur in peatlands, which are highly combustible when drained of water to be converted into agricultural plantations.

Thick haze in Borneo -- where air quality levels have plummeted to "dangerous" levels in some areas -- caused the cancellation of about a dozen flights Sunday, national airline Garuda said.

Rival Lion Air said about 160 Borneo flights had been affected at the weekend.

Meanwhile, nearly 150,000 people have been treated for acute respiratory infections linked to the haze in recent months, according to Indonesian health authorities.

Nearly 150,000 people have been treated for acute respiratory infections 

linked to the haze in recent months (AFP Photo/Str)

While forest fires are an annual problem, the situation this year has been worsened by drier weather in Indonesia, with diplomatic tensions soaring as toxic smog drifts over to neighbouring Malaysia and Singapore.

The haze pushed Singapore's air quality to unhealthy levels for the first time in three years at the weekend.

In 2015, Indonesia suffered its worst forest fires for almost two decades, which dramatically increased its greenhouse gas emissions.

Huge fires tearing through the Amazon are also compounding concerns about the long-term impact of such blazes on keeping global temperature levels stable.

Related Articles:

Singapore air 'unhealthy' ahead of F1 race

Indonesia is battling forest fires causing toxic haze across southeast Asia with aircraft, artificial rain and even prayer, President Joko Widodo said during a visit to a hard-hit areahttps://t.co/eyIkMCRURG

— AFP news agency (@AFP) 17 september 2019

Indonesia Introduces New Finance Facility to Meet Paris Climate Agreement Goals

Jakarta Globe, Ratri M. Siniwi,  October 27, 2016

Wind turbines used for generating electricity in East Sumba, East Nusa
Tenggara, in this April 2015 file photo. (Antara Photo/Hafiz Mubarak A.)

Jakarta. A new facility has been introduced in Indonesia that will be used to promote economic development to stimulate green growth and improve rural livelihoods.

The Tropical Landscapes Finance Facility, consisting of a loan fund and a grant fund, aims to achieve climate targets set under the Paris Agreement. It will make public funding available to finance renewable energy production and sustainable landscape management.

"This ground-breaking and innovative financial platform, a world first, can transform the lives and livelihoods of millions of Indonesians in rural areas that deserve it the most," Tropical Landscapes Finance Facility steering committee chairman Dr. Kuntoro Mangkusubroto said in a statement on Wednesday (26/10).

Through sustainable production of agricultural commodities, the facility will scale up investment in renewable energy to assist the rural poor.

The Ministry of Environment and Forestry fully backs the facility as it falls in line with Indonesia's sustainable development aspirations.

"The Indonesian government realizes that we can only achieve the sustainable development goals through holistic policies, such as integrated landscape management," Coordinating Economic Affairs Minister Darmin Nasution said. "The facility aims to improve smallholder productivity while at the same time conserving our natural environment."

Along with the facility's steering committee, French bank and financial services company BNP Paribas and multinational investment manager ADM Capital will manage the loan fund.

"By joining in a partnership with the Tropical Landscapes Financing Facility in the capacity of capital markets and structuring adviser, BNP Paribas will help create innovative and collaborative financing mechanisms to bring private capital at scale and with good governance and risk management principles to fund long-term sustainable development projects," BNP Paribas Indonesia chief executive Luc Cardyn said.

The facility's secretariat will be managed by the United Nations Environment Program.

"The facility will trigger progress across several sustainable development goals, including saving the climate, protecting biodiversity and fostering renewable energy," UN Assistant Secretary General Elliott Harris said.

Related Articles:

Joyful ministers seal landmark Paris Agreement to stop global warming

"Recalibration of Free Choice"–  Mar 3, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll) - (Subjects: (Old) Souls, Midpoint on 21-12-2012, Shift of Human Consciousness, Black & White vs. Color, 1 - Spirituality (Religions) shifting, Loose a Pope “soon”, 2 - Humans will change react to drama, 3 - Civilizations/Population on Earth,  4 - Alternate energy sources (Geothermal, Tidal (Paddle wheels), Wind), 5 – Financials Institutes/concepts will change (Integrity – Ethical) , 6 - News/Media/TV to change, 7 – Big Pharmaceutical company will collapse “soon”, (Keep people sick), (Integrity – Ethical)  8 – Wars will be over on Earth, Global Unity, … etc.) - (Text version)

“…  4 - Energy (again)

The natural resources of the planet are finite and will not support the continuation of what you've been doing. We've been saying this for a decade. Watch for increased science and increased funding for alternate ways of creating electricity (finally). Watch for the very companies who have the most to lose being the ones who fund it. It is the beginning of a full realization that a change of thinking is at hand. You can take things from Gaia that are energy, instead of physical resources. We speak yet again about geothermal, about tidal, about wind. Again, we plead with you not to over-engineer this. For one of the things that Human Beings do in a technological age is to over-engineer simple things. Look at nuclear - the most over-engineered and expensive steam engine in existence!

Your current ideas of capturing energy from tidal and wave motion don't have to be technical marvels. Think paddle wheel on a pier with waves, which will create energy in both directions [waves coming and going] tied to a generator that can power dozens of neighborhoods, not full cities. Think simple and decentralize the idea of utilities. The same goes for wind and geothermal. Think of utilities for groups of homes in a cluster. You won't have a grid failure if there is no grid. This is the way of the future, and you'll be more inclined to have it sooner than later if you do this, and it won't cost as much.

Water

We've told you that one of the greatest natural resources of the planet, which is going to shift and change and be mysterious to you, is fresh water. It's going to be the next gold, dear ones. So, we have also given you some hints and examples and again we plead: Even before the potentials of running out of it, learn how to desalinate water in real time without heat. It's there, it's doable, and some already have it in the lab. This will create inexpensive fresh water for the planet.

There is a change of attitude that is starting to occur. Slowly you're starting to see it and the only thing getting in the way of it are those companies with the big money who currently have the old system. That's starting to change as well. For the big money always wants to invest in what it knows is coming next, but it wants to create what is coming next within the framework of what it has "on the shelf." What is on the shelf is oil, coal, dams, and non-renewable resource usage. It hasn't changed much in the last 100 years, has it? Now you will see a change of free choice. You're going to see decisions made in the boardrooms that would have curled the toes of those two generations ago. Now "the worst thing they could do" might become "the best thing they could do." That, dear ones, is a change of free choice concept. When the thinkers of tomorrow see options that were never options before, that is a shift. That was number four. ….”

"A Summary" – Apr 2, 2011 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Religion, Shift of Human Consciousness, 2012, Intelligent/Benevolent Design, EU, South America, 5 Currencies, Water Cycle (Heat up, Mini Ice Ace, Oceans, Fish, Earthquakes ..), Middle East, Internet, Israel, Dictators, Palestine, US, Japan (Quake/Tsunami Disasters , People, Society ...), Nuclear Power Revealed, Hydro Power, Geothermal Power, Moon, Financial Institutes (Recession, Realign integrity values ..) , China, North Korea, Global Unity,..... etc.) - (Text version)

“... Japan

Let us talk for a moment about Japan, and then I'll close the day of messages. There are thousands of souls on my side of the veil and they're just fine, more than fine. We have spoken so often of what happens at the Wind of Birth. I told you, before they even came in, they saw the potential. I looked in their eyes. "You may not last long. You know that, don't you? You're coming into this planet and you may not be here very long. And the passing that you will have with your family will not be pleasant, if any ever are. Why would you come in anyway?" I want to tell you what they said. When a soul has the mind of God, it understands fully what generates peace and what generates energy shift. You can clearly see what generates what the planet needs the most when you are about to arrive. So they said, "We're going to be part of one of the biggest compassion events the planet has ever seen." One earthquake, one tsunami. All of those who left that day will change the earth forever. And it already has. It was the same for the last tsunami as well.

Every single one of them on my side of the veil is getting ready to come back. Many old souls were involved, and just for a moment, if they could give you any information, if they could talk to you right now, if they could speak your language and look into your eyes, they would thank you for your compassion for them and those who are left. And they would say, "Be with those family members who are still alive. Enter their hearts every day and give them peace and keep them from crying, because we're OK."

Nuclear Power Revealed

So let me tell you what else they did. They just showed you what's wrong with nuclear power. "Safe to the maximum," they said. "Our devices are strong and cannot fail." But they did. They are no match for Gaia.

It seems that for more than 20 years, every single time we sit in the chair and speak of electric power, we tell you that hundreds of thousands of tons of push/pull energy on a regular schedule is available to you. It is moon-driven, forever. It can make all of the electricity for all of the cities on your planet, no matter how much you use. There's no environmental impact at all. Use the power of the tides, the oceans, the waves in clever ways. Use them in a bigger way than any designer has ever put together yet, to power your cities. The largest cities on your planet are on the coasts, and that's where the power source is. Hydro is the answer. It's not dangerous. You've ignored it because it seems harder to engineer and it's not in a controlled environment. Yet, you've chosen to build one of the most complex and dangerous steam engines on Earth - nuclear power.

We also have indicated that all you have to do is dig down deep enough and the planet will give you heat. It's right below the surface, not too far away all the time. You'll have a Gaia steam engine that way, too. There's no danger at all and you don't have to dig that far. All you have to do is heat fluid, and there are some fluids that boil far faster than water. So we say it again and again. Maybe this will show you what's wrong with what you've been doing, and this will turn the attitudes of your science to create something so beautiful and so powerful for your grandchildren. Why do you think you were given the moon? Now you know.

This benevolent Universe gave you an astral body that allows the waters in your ocean to push and pull and push on the most regular schedule of anything you know of. Yet there you sit enjoying just looking at it instead of using it. It could be enormous, free energy forever, ready to be converted when you design the methods of capturing it. It's time.

So in closing, do you understand what you're seeing? You're seeing intelligent design, quantum energy and high consciousness. You are seeing changes in Human nature. You're seeing countries putting things together instead of separating. You are seeing those who don't want war and instead want peace, good schools for their children, safety in their streets and a say in their government. We told you it was going to happen this way. I want my partner to teach these things that I have said in his 3D lectures for awhile. Many won't be able to know these things otherwise.  …”

Singapore banks urged to curtail loans to haze-linked firms

Yahoo – AFP, Martin Abbugao, 9 Oct 2015

A worker waters a field as downtown buildings are shrouded in smog in
Singapore on October 5, 2015 (AFP Photo/Roslan Rahman)

Singapore (AFP) - An umbrella group of local and foreign banks in smog-hit Singapore has urged members to make "sustainable development" part of their lending requirements, stepping up pressure on companies linked to land-clearing fires in Indonesia.

The 158-member Association of Banks in Singapore (ABS) on Thursday issued guidelines for the inclusion of greenhouse gas emissions, deforestation, forest degradation and biodiversity loss among the criteria for approving commercial loans.

The move came in the wake of fires illegally started to clear land for plantations on Sumatra island and the Indonesian part of Borneo, which have shrouded Singapore and Malaysia in acrid smoke since early September.

"The banking sector in Singapore wants to play a bigger role in driving responsible business and long-term sustainable development," ABS director Ong-Ang Ai Boon said in a statement.

The smoky haze has also reached the popular Thai holiday islands of Phuket and Samui, forcing several planes packed with beach-bound tourists to turn back.

Palm oil and pulp and paper companies are believed to be the main culprits behind the use of burning to clear massive tracts of land for their plantations, but prosecution by Indonesian authorities has been rare, prompting affected countries like Singapore to resort to economic pressure.

Singapore's biggest supermarket chain, NTUC Fairprice, this week withdrew from its shelves all paper products sourced from Indonesian-owned Asia Pulp & Paper (APP), which has corporate offices in the city-state.

The company's suppliers are suspected of starting forest fires in Indonesia.

The Fullerton Hotel is blanketed in thick haze, in Singapore, on September 24,

2015 (AFP Photo/Roslan Rahman)

Related Articles:

Singapore moves against Indonesian firms over haze
Malaysia shuts schools as choking smog worsens

World Bank Urges Better Resource Management in Indonesia

Indonesia loses $4 billion from its rain forests to illegal logging.

Jakarta Globe, Vanesha Manuturi, Jun 10, 2015

Farming is seen in the protected areas of the Kerinci National Park (TNKS),
in Kerinci, Jambi, in May. (Antara Photo/Wahdi Septiawan)

Jakarta. The World Bank has pressed Indonesia to improve resource management and governance as the country works towards more sustainable and environmentally-friendly economic growth over the next five years.

“Indonesia has enjoyed tremendous growth … but not all are benefiting from these achievements and they come with a high price of environmental degradation,” said Sri Mulyani Indrawati, managing director and chief operating officer at the World Bank, on the first day of the Indonesia Green Infrastructure Summit 2015 in Jakarta on Tuesday.

She pointed to Indonesia’s forestry industry as an example of the country’s murky governance track record.

“Every year, Indonesia loses some $4 billion through illegal logging. Meanwhile, revenue from forestry licensing amounts to only $300 million per year,” she said. “This is a problem of governance, manifested in poor performance that impacts the implementation of existing regulations or design of better laws.”

Sri Mulyani — who was a former finance minister in the Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s administration before resigning in 2010 — also noted “an information gap” among government agencies in Indonesia, which has led to a lack of transparency and efficiency in resource management.

“The energy sector, for example, needs more and better data on simple energy use and emissions,” she said.

Still, the World Bank managing director praised the government’s moratorium on new fishing permits for large operations as an “encouraging development.”

“A well-managed ‘blue’ economy can ensure food security, promote sustainable tourism and build resilience. But degradation through overfishing and dumped waste exacerbates poverty and undermines food security globally,” she said.

Improving governance of the fisheries sector coupled with large-scale investment in maritime transport and trade infrastructure could double fish production in the next five years, according to Sri.

During the same summit, Vice President Jusuf Kalla admitted the government’s stance to maintaining a sustainable economic growth has been lackluster.

“We’ve always thought about environmental issues after we’re faced with problems,” Kalla said.

“We’ve learnt and we are now learning with economic principles that are sustainable so that we can pass down this country for the next generation.”

Under President Joko Widodo, the government wants to boost growth to 7 percent over the next five years, bolstered by greater investment — both by the government and the private sector — in infrastructure development.

Joko’s infrastructure vision for the country includes the development of new power plants with a total capacity of 35,000 megawatts and nine million hectares of agriculture land across the country.

In a bid to encourage more environmentally-friendly investments, Indonesia currently offers tax allowances to nine business areas relating to environmental preservation, including geothermal power, refining and natural gas processing industry, organic basic chemical industry, and clean water reservoir and purification industry.

In April, Environment and Forestry Minister Siti Nurbaya said that the ministry plans to offer more incentives — such as soft-loan facilities, business permit extensions and free import duties — to local and foreign investors with technology which reduces pollution and conserves energy.

GlobeAsia

Fortune Ranks Surabaya Mayor Risma Among World’s Greatest Leaders

Jakarta Globe, Mar 27, 2015

Surabaya Mayor Tri Rismaharini. (JG Photo/Yudek)

Jakarta. Surabaya Mayor Tri Rismaharini has been named as one of the world’s 50 greatest leaders by American business magazine Fortune.

Risma, as she is popularly known, is ranked 24th on the list, above Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Xiaomi’s CEO Lei Jun and Nigeria’s Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala. She is the only Indonesian included.

“Elected as Surabaya’s mayor in 2010, Rismaharini has transformed her city of 2.7 million people into a new kind of Indonesian metropolis, one that celebrates green space and environmental sustainability,” the magazine said.

Other notable leaders included were China’s Xi Jinping, India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi, European Central Bank President Mario Draghi and Apple CEO Tim Cook, who is ranked top of the list.

In February last year Risma was named world mayor of the month by the City Mayor Foundation.

Risma, who has a degree in architecture, rose to fame in 2005 as the head of the Surabaya park department which is responsible for rejuvenating the city’s parks and developing more green spaces.

The mayor has been praised for her hands-on approach to the city’s problems, such as picking up trash along the roadside or getting out of her car and directing traffic.

But not everyone has been happy with her performance. Last year, she received both praise and criticism for closing down Indonesia’s biggest red light district, also known as Dolly. She sent sex workers back to their home towns with a small amount of money to start new businesses.

Surabaya Mayor Tri Rismaharini. (JG Photo/Yudek)

Related Article:

Surabaya’s Tri Rismaharini Honored as One of World’s Best Mayors

SBY Honored, Along With Companies, for Green Growth

Jakarta Globe, Feb 26, 2015

Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono when he was still president of Indonesia. (EPA
Photo/Bagus Indahono).

Jakarta. Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono was among a diverse group of winners of awards for sustainable business practices whose names were announced on Wednesday evening, with the former Indonesian president receiving praise for “his achievements in developing green growth in Indonesia and his commitments to action on climate change globally.”

A Special Award for Leadership in Green Growth and Development was presented to Yudhoyono at the Shangri La Hotel Jakarta, during a ceremony attended by Vice President Jusuf Kalla, Coordinating Minister for the Economy Sofyan Djalil and other ministers, as well as CEOs, heads of international agencies and media.

“Development and growth is something that needs to be planned carefully. It needs to ensure social inclusiveness. It needs to protect the environment, it needs to correspond to climate challenge, it needs to go on for the long term,” Yudhoyono said at the award ceremony.

The 2014 Sustainable Business Awards Indonesia were organized by Global Initiatives in cooperation with PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin) and the Indonesia Business Council for Sustainable Development.

The organizers said in a press release that cement company Holcim Indonesia emerged the overall winner, but companies such as Bank BNI, Astra International, Bukit Asam, Nestle Indonesia, Bumi Serpong Damai and Unilever also won in various categories.

Tony Gourlay, CEO of Global Initiatives, said in the press release: “For the third year in a row, we are pleased to showcase companies in Indonesia who have embedded sustainability in their corporate mission and whose leadership shares this vision. We encourage other companies to follow their lead and communicate their sustainability efforts more widely.”

The complete list of SBA winners

MAIN AWARDS

Overall Winner: Holcim Indonesia

1. Strategy and vision: Unilever Indonesia

2. Workforce: Holcim Indonesia

3. Community: Astra International

4. Energy management: Holcim Indonesia

5. Water management: Bukit Asam

6. Waste & material productivity: Danone Aqua Group

7. Climate Change: Holcim Indonesia

8. Supply Chain: Nestle Indonesia

9. Land Use, Biodiversity and the Environment: Monsanto Indonesia (Branita Sandini)

10. Business Responsibility and Ethics: Unilever Indonesia

* Environmental Disclosure: Dupont Agriculture Products Indonesia

SPECIAL RECOGNITION AWARDS

1. Pioneer in Green Finance in Indonesia: Bank Negara Indonesia

2. Outstanding leadership in sustainable agriculture: Great Giant Pineapple

3. SME placing sustainability at the core of its business: Pulau Nikoi

4. Outstanding Energy Management in the mining sector: Vale Indonesia

5. Outstanding Water Management in the property sector: Bumi Serpong Damai

Special Award for Green Growth & Leadership: Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono

VP Kalla Tells Business Owners to Behave

Jakarta Globe, Novianti Setuningsih, Dec 08, 2014

Vice President Jusuf Kalla, left, talking with Trade Minister Rachmet Gobel at
 the leadership meeting of the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry
(Kadin) on Monday. (Antara Photo/Muhammad Adimaja)

Jakarta. Vice President Jusuf Kalla in a speech for the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin) on Monday urged the nation’s entrepreneurs to stop ruining the environment and pay their taxes.

“In the wood-trading era, in the 1960s and 70s, a lot of trees were cut down, causing floods that we still have to deal with until now,” said Kalla, himself a successful businessman.

The vice president also told the hundreds of entrepreneurs attending Kadin’s national leadership meeting that the government was going to improve its natural resources management.

“The mining sector was profiting while our environment was wasted. The [new] regulation is made to protect our natural resources,” Kalla said.

He added that business should also pay all taxes and royalties they owe, and that owners could be banned from traveling abroad if they fail to do so.

Kalla explained that the government needed the income from taxes and royalties to help fund its program to improve the nation’s infrastructure.

Related Article:

Jokowi’s Call for Ecological Reform Reaches Palm Oil Firms

US Reduces Indonesian Debt in Exchange for Wildlife Protection

Jakarta Globe – AFP, Oct 04, 2014

A pangolin is held in a private zoo on the outskirts of Kandang town in Aceh, Sumatra,
 where animals are displayed for visitors and buyers on on June 9, 2013. (AFP Photo/
Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Program/Paul Hilton)

The United States has struck a deal to reduce Indonesia’s debts in exchange for Jakarta pledging about $12 million for programs to protect endangered species and their habitats on Sumatra island, conservationists said Friday.

The move adds to a similar agreement in 2009, under which the Indonesian government pledged $30 million for increased protection of Sumatra’s forests, said NGO Conservation International, which helped broker the deal.

The agreement, which was inked this week, will provide additional funds for environmental groups to improve programmes aimed at protecting the Sumatran low-land rainforests as well as efforts to increase populations of threatened animals.

The forests of Sumatra, a huge island in western Indonesia, are one of the most biodiverse places on the planet and are home to critically endangered Sumatran rhinos and tigers.

“The debt-for-nature swap will benefit critical ecosystems in Sumatra through increasing conservation efforts,” Conservation International said in a statement.

“The United States is proud to partner with the government of Indonesia and the NGO sector to help protect and preserve the diverse wildlife that exists on Sumatra,” said Kristen Bauer, charge d’affaires at the US embassy in Jakarta.

Under the agreement, the Indonesian government will pay about $12 million over seven years into a trust that will issue grants for the conservation efforts, Conservation International said.

The US government contributed most of the money for the debt swap, while Conservation International also gave some.

Agence France-Presse

Rabobank under fire over Indonesia palm oil investments

DutchNews.nl, Saturday 28 June 2014

A palm oil plantation (NOS/AFP)

Environmental group Milieudefensie has made a formal complaint against Rabobank with the OECD, saying the bank is breaking rules on deforestation.

Milieudefensie says the bank has some €47m invested in Indonesia palm oil company Bumitama which it says operates illegal plantations and is guilty of illegally cutting down forests. This, in turn, is threatening the habitat of orangutans, the organisation says.

Rabobank says it is in talks with Bumitama in an effort to improve its operations but Milieudefensie says this is taking too long. ‘Rabobank has showed itself to be extremely naïve in this and has a blinkered view,’ spokesman Geert Ritsema told the Volkskrant.

Illegal deforestation is not only against Rabobank’s own policy but against OECD agreements on socially responsible business.

If the OECD upholds the complaint, Rabobank could be excluded from taking part in trade missions and from some subsidies, the Volkskrant said.

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SBY Apolgizes to Singapore and Malaysia For Haze

Jakarta Globe, June 24, 2013

Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono gestures while Greenpeace
 International executive director Kumi Naidoo and First Lady Ani Yudhoyono
 look on during a visit aboard Greenpeace’s Rainbow Warrior ship, which was
anchored in Jakarta on June 7. (AFP Photo)

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has offered a formal apology to Singapore and Malaysia for the haze that has been blanketing both countries as a result of forest fires in Riau.

The president blamed the forest fires on both humans and nature, saying the winds in Sumatra that were headed towards Singapore, Malaysia and Philippines had contributed to the thick haze.

“For this incident, I as the president would like to apologize especially to Singapore and Malaysia and hope they would understand. Indonesia did not want this to happen and we are trying to overcome this responsibly,” said Yudhoyono in a press conference at the State Palace on Monday.

Yudhoyono also criticized the Riau administration for its slow response to anticipating the haze from the beginning and called on provinces prone to forest fires to focus on containing fires in their respective areas.

“To be honest, I think Riau was quite slow in anticipating this from the beginning. But there’s no need to play the blame game. Let’s just [work] to overcome the haze and fires immediately,” he said.

Earlier, the president took to Twitter to say he would take strict action against companies involved in burning forests to clear land for new plantation areas.

“Indonesia will seriously overcome the forest fires in Riau and will take stern action against foreign companies that were involved,” the president tweeted on Monday.

Yudhoyono said the government was still working hard to contain the fire, adding the forest fires in Riau not only caused haze at home but also in neighboring countries Singapore and Malaysia.

Both neighboring countries have lodged protests and offered help to contain the forest fires. 
Yudhoyono said efforts to contain fires from the land turned out to be ineffective and that’s why the government had deployed helicopters.

“The government is deploying two Bolco helicopters and one Colibri helicopter to contain hotspots in Riau. The efforts through land have been ineffective,” he said.

Minister of Environment Balthasar Kambuanya previously said there were indications that eight Malaysian-owned companies were involved in setting off fires to open new plantation areas in Riau.

The eight companies implicated are Langgam Inti Hiberida, Bumi Rakksa Sejati, Tunggal Mitra Plantation, Udaya Loh Dinawi, Adei Plantation, Jatim Jaya Perkasa, Multi Gambut Industri, and Mustika Agro Lestari.

The Forestry Ministry and the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) as well as other related ministries had sent teams to the fields to ensure efforts to contain the fires were successful and to take legal measures against people or companies that violated regulations to start a fire to clear lands.
Meanwhile, Sime Darby Plantation denied that its subsidiaries in Indonesia were involved in the fire.

“There have been no area-expansion activities in the operational areas of Tunggal Mitra Plantation, and Bhumireksa Nusa Sejati in Riau since April 2013. 
This needs to be emphasized given the planting process of oil palm trees can only be done every 20 to 25 years, not every year,” said Inasanti Susanto, head of Minamas Plantation Corporate Communications in a press release on Monday.

Inasanti said Sime Darby Plantation strictly adopts a zero burning policy in its operational areas and the policy has been implemented since 1985. 
However, Inasanti admitted a small portion of its plantation areas were inhabited by local residents to comply with Indonesian laws that require companies to protect  local residents who lived around the operational areas.

Riau Police said it has arrested two people suspected of setting of fire in Riau, including a former Bank Rakyat Indonesia official identified as HP. 
“One of them , S (64), a resident at Rupat Utara, Bengkalis, is being processed by the Bengkalis Police and the other one is HP (56), a Rokan Ilir resident.

‘‘They cleared the land by starting fires,” said National Police spokesman Sr Comr Agus Rianto at the National Police headquarters in Jakarta on Monday.
Agus said that both men were farmers and were not related to any companies.

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KompasOtomotif

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono recently signed a government regulation aimed at supporting the development of environmentally-friendly vehicles in Indonesia.

Newsportal Kompas.com reported on Tuesday that Yudhoyono signed the Low Emission Car Project decree, which seeks to curb taxes and boost demand for greener cars.

“The president signed it yesterday [Monday],” Johnny Darmawan, the president director of Toyota Astra Motor, told Kompas.com on Monday.

An anonymous source at the Ministry of Industry also confirmed to Kompas that the decree had been signed.

The regulation stipulates special tax incentives for eco-friendly vehicles such as hybrids and electric cars. Furthermore, it notes that such cars must be assembled in Indonesia and fulfill the minimum standard for local parts to receive the tax break.

“It was proposed that luxury taxes would not apply to low-cost green cars ,” Budi Darmadi, the director general of advanced industry based on high technology at the Ministry of Industry, said.

Previously, Astra International said the company would delay production of its eco-friendly vehicle model, the Ayla.

Astra Daihatsu director Pongky Prabowo said the company is waiting for government regulations on low-cost green cars before it starts producing the Daihatsu Ayla and the Toyota Agya, the latter a collaboration with Toyota Motors.

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'The Sumatran rainforest will mostly disappear within 20 years'

In only a few years, logging and agribusiness have cut Indonesia's vast rainforest by half. The government has renewed a moratorium on deforestation but it may already be too late for the endangered animals –and for the people whose lives lie in ruin

The Guardian, John Vidal, The Observer, Sunday 26 May 2013

Link to video: Sumatra, Indonesia: the rainforest's last stand

Our small plane had been flying low over Sumatra for three hours but all we had seen was an industrial landscape of palm and acacia trees stretching 30 miles in every direction. A haze of blue smoke from newly cleared land drifted eastward over giant plantations. Long drainage canals dug through equatorial swamps dissected the land. The only sign of life was excavators loading trees onto barges to take to pulp mills.

The end is in sight for the great forests of Sumatra and Borneo and the animals and people who depend on them. Thirty years ago the world's third- and sixth-largest islands were full of tigers, elephants, rhinos, orangutan and exotic birds and plants but in a frenzy of development they have been trashed in a single generation by global agribusiness and pulp and paper industries.

Their plantations supply Britain and the world with toilet paper, biofuels and vegetable oil to make everyday foods such as margarine, cream cheese and chocolate, but distraught scientists and environmental groups this week warn that one of the 21st century's greatest ecological disasters is rapidly unfolding.

Official figures show more than half of Indonesia's rainforest, the third-largest swath in the world, has been felled in a few years and permission has been granted to convert up to 70% of what remains into palm or acacia plantations. The government last week renewed a moratorium on the felling of rainforest, but nearly a million hectares are still being cut each year and the last pristine areas, in provinces such as Ache and Papua, are now prime targets for giant logging, palm and mining companies.

The toll on wildlife across an area nearly the size of Europe is vast, say scientists who warn that many of Indonesia's species could be extinct in the wild within 20-30 years. Orangutan numbers are in precipitous decline, only 250-400 tigers remain and fewer than 100 rhino are left in the forests, said the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

Millions of hectares are nominally protected, but the forest is fragmented, national parks are surrounded by plantations, illegal loggers work with impunity and corruption is rife in government. "This is the fastest, most comprehensive transformation of an entire landscape that has ever taken place anywhere in the world including the Amazon. If it continues at this rate all that will be left in 20 years is a few fragmented areas of natural forest surrounded by huge manmade plantations. There will be increased floods, fires and droughts but no animals," said Yuyun Indradi, political forest campaigner with Greenpeace southeast Asia in Jakarta.

Last night the WWF's chief Asian tiger expert pleaded with the Indonesian government and the world to stop the growth of palm oil plantations. "Forest conversion is massive. We urgently need stronger commitment from the government and massive support from the people. We cannot tolerate any further conversion of natural forests," said Sunarto Sunarto in Jakarta.

Indonesia's deforestation has been accompanied by rising violence, say watchdog groups. Last year, more than 600 major land conflicts were recorded in the palm plantations. Many turned violent as communities that had lost their traditional forest fought multinational companies and security forces. More than 5,000 human rights abuses were recorded, with 22 deaths and hundreds of injuries.

"The legacy of deforestation has been conflict, increased poverty, migration to the cities and the erosion of habitat for animals. As the forests come down, social conflicts are exploding everywhere," said Abetnego Tarigan, director of Walhi, Indonesia's largest environment group.

Scientists fear that the end of the forest could come quickly. Conflict-wracked Aceh, which bore the brunt of the tsunami in 2004, will lose more than half its trees if a new government plan to change the land use is pushed through. A single Canadian mining company is seeking to exploit 1.77m hectares for mining, logging and palm plantations.

Large areas of central Sumatra and Kalimantan are being felled as coal, copper and gold mining companies move in. Millions of hectares of forest in west Papua are expected to be converted to palm plantations.

"Papuans, some of the poorest citizens in Indonesia, are being utterly exploited in legally questionable oil palm land deals that provide huge financial opportunities for international investors at the expense of the people and forests of West Papua," said Jago Wadley, a forest campaigner with the Environment Investigation Agency.

Despite a commitment last week from the government to extend a moratorium on deforestation for two years, Indonesia is still cutting down its forests faster than any other country. Loopholes in the law mean the moratorium only covers new licences and primary forests, and excludes key peatland areas and existing concessions which are tiger and elephant habitats. "No one seems able to stop the destruction," said Greenpeace International's forest spokesman, Phil Aikman.

The conflicts often arise when companies are granted dubious logging or plantation permissions that overlap with community-managed traditional forests and protected areas such as national parks.

Nine villages have been in conflict with the giant paper company April, which has permission to convert, with others, 450,000 hectares of deep peat forests on the Kampar Peninsula in central Sumatra. Because the area contains as much as 1.5bn tonnes of carbon, it has global importance in the fight against climate change.

"We would die for this [forest] if necessary. This is a matter of life and death. The forest is our life. We depend on it when we want to build our houses or boats. We protect it. The permits were handed out illegally, but now we have no option but to work for the companies or hire ourselves out for pitiful wages," said one village leader from Teluk Meranti who feared to give his name.

They accuse corrupt local officials of illegally grabbing their land. April, which strongly denies involvement in corruption, last week announced plans to work with London-based Flora and Fauna international to restore 20,000 hectares of degraded forest land.

Fifty miles away, near the town of Rengit, villagers watched in horror last year when their community forest was burned down – they suspect by people in the pay of a large palm oil company. "Life is terrible now. We are ruined. We used to get resin, wood, timber, fuel from the forest. Now we have no option but to work for the palm oil company. The company beat us. The fire was deliberate. This forest was everything for us. We used it as our supermarket, building store, chemist shop and fuel supplier for generations of people. Now we must put plastic on our roofs," said one man from the village of Bayesjaya who also asked not to be named.

Mursyi Ali from the village of Kuala Cenaku in the province of Riau, has spent 10 years fighting oil plantation companies which were awarded a giant concession. "Maybe 35,000 people have been impacted by their plantations. Everyone is very upset. People have died in protests. I have not accepted defeat yet. These conflicts are going on everywhere. Before the companies came we had a lot of natural resources, like honey, rattan, fish, shrimps and wood," he said.

"We had all we wanted. That all went when the companies came. Everything that we depended on went. Deforestaion has led to pollution and health problems. We are all poorer now. I blame the companies and the government, but most of all the government," he continued. He pleaded with the company: "Please resolve this problem and give us back the 4,100 hectares of land. We would die for this if necessary. This is a life or death," he says.

Greenpeace and other groups accuse the giant pulp and palm companies of trashing tens of thousands of hectares of rainforest a year but the companies respond that they are the forest defenders and without them the ecological devastation would be worse. "There has been a rampant escalation of the denuding of the landscape but it is mostly by migrant labour and palm oil growers. Poverty and illegal logging along with migrant labour have caused the deforestation," said April's spokesman, David Goodwin.

"What April does is not deforestation. In establishing acacia plantations in already-disturbed forest areas, it is contributing strongly to reforestation. Last year April planted more than 100 million trees. Deforestation happens because of highly organised illegal logging, slash-and-burn practices by migrant labour, unregulated timber operations. There has been a explosion of palm oil concessions."

The company would not reveal how much rainforest it and its suppliers fell each year but internal papers seen by the Observer show that it planned to deforest 60,000 hectares of rainforest in 2012 but postponed this pending the moratorium. It admits that it has a concession of 20,000 hectares of forest that it has permission to fell and that it takes up to one third of its timber from "mixed tropical hardwood" for its giant pulp and paper mill near Penabaru in Riau.

There are some signs of hope. The heat is now on other large palm oil and paper companies after Asia Pacific Resources International (APP), one of the world's largest pulp and paper companies, was persuaded this year by international and local Indonesian groups to end all rainforest deforestation and to rely solely on its plantations for its wood.

The company, which admits to having felled hundreds of thousands of acres of Sumatran forest in the last 20 years, had been embarrassed and financially hurt when other global firms including Adidas, Kraft, Mattel, Hasbro, Nestlé, Carrefour, Staples and Unilever dropped products made by APP that had been made with rainforest timber.

"We thought that if we adopted national laws to protect the forest that this would be enough. But it clearly was not. We realised something was not right and that we needed a much higher standard. So now we will stop the deforestation, whatever the cost. We are now convinced that the long term benefits will be greater," said Aida Greenbury, APP's sustainability director. "Yes. We got it wrong. We could not have done worse."

This file aerial photograph taken on June 7, 2012 shows lush

tropical forest in Central Kalimantan (AFP Photo/Romeo Gacad)

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