Orangutan Conservancy

A rescued male Sumatran orangutan learns to climb tree branches at the quarantine center of Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Program in Sumatra. (AFP Photo/Romeo Gacad)

By Angela Dewan for the Jakarta Globe

Sibolangit. A baby Sumatran orangutan swings playfully on a branch at an Indonesian rescue center, a far cry from the terror he endured when his pristine rainforest home was razed to the ground.

Now alarm is growing at a plan activists say will open up new swathes of virgin forest on Sumatra island for commercial exploitation and lay roads through a vital ecosystem, increasing the risk to many endangered species.

The plan, which Aceh authorities say aims to open up a small amount of forest for communities to develop, is set to be approved by Jakarta despite its moves towards extending a national moratorium on new logging permits.

Green groups say such policies illustrate how the ban can be circumvented to open up new areas for deforestation, threatening to boost Indonesia’s already high emissions of carbon dioxide.

“This plan is a huge threat to species living in the forest, especially orangutans, tigers and elephants that live in the lowland forests that will likely be cleared first,” Ian Singleton of the Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Program told AFP.

Environmentalists warn that some one million hectares — around the size of Cyprus — could be opened up in Aceh province for exploitation by mining, palm oil and paper companies. Officials dispute that figure.

There are particular fears about part of the project which would lay roads through the Leuser ecosystem, an area of stunning beauty where peat swamp and dense forest surround waterfalls and mountains poking through clouds.

The area, mostly in Aceh, is home to around 5,800 of the remaining 6,600 critically endangered Sumatran orangutans as well as elephants, bears and snakes including King Cobras.

Singleton warns that cases like that of the baby ape, rescued from Leuser, would rise dramatically if the road project goes ahead, as orangutan populations need long, uninterrupted stretches of forest to survive.

This excerpt from a news article appeared in and is courtesy of the Jakarta Globe. To read the full article please click here.

photo courtesy of Mongabay.com

from Mongbay.com

An initiative that aims to improve the social and environmental performance of  palm oil production is faltering in its mission by failing to establish strong  performance standards on greenhouse gas emissions and pesticide use, argues a  new statement issued by WWF, the initiative’s biggest green supporter.

The  statement, published on the eve of a major meeting of the Roundtable  on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), says that RSPO certification alone can no longer  be considered an adequate measure of environmental sustainability for  “progressive” companies. It says companies that aim to minimize the impact of  their palm oil production, trade, and/or consumption should now target  performance standards that include public reporting of greenhouse gas emissions,  eliminating the use of Class 1A and 1B pesticides, and establishing policies  that exclude the purchase of oil palm fruit from illegally cleared or occupied  lands. Those standards were excluded from the recently updated RSPO principles and  criteria, which will go to a vote at the RSPO meeting on April 25 in Kuala  Lumpur.

The statement from WWF is especially significant given the  group’s role in the formation and progress of the RSPO. For years WWF has pushed  for producers, traders, and consumers to adopt RSPO certification as the  standard for responsible production and use of palm oil. The effort has resulted  in a steady increase in RSPO-certified palm oil’s market share, but also  complaints from some environmentalists who say the initiative does not go far  enough to limit deforestation, conversion of peatlands, or social conflict.

This excerpt from a news article appeared on and is courtesy of Mongabay.com.  To read the full article click here: http://news.mongabay.com/2013/0423-rspo-pandcs.html?fbfnpg#tYvZcg8u4GUAOJzv.99

Two excellent sites to learn more about palm oil and the RSPO are Palm Oil Consumer Action at  http://www.palmoilconsumers.com/index.html and Say No To Palm Oil at http://www.saynotopalmoil.com/palm-oil.php. 

The website for RSPO is http://www.rspo.org/.  The website for WWF is http://worldwildlife.org/.

A worker harvests palm fruit in a plantation owned by PT Tinting Boyok Sawit Mandiri (TBSM) in Sanggau district, West Kalimantan. Photo: (Antara/Jessica Helena Wuysang)

by Anggi M. Lubis for the The Jakarta Post

The Indonesian Palm Oil Association (Gapki) has opposed the government’s plan to prolong a two-year forest moratorium, slated to end in May, saying that such an extension would only hamper the expansion of the country’s palm oil sector.

Indonesia, through Presidential Instruction No. 10/2011, had set a two-year moratorium to halt the commercial use of a total 65.2 million hectares of primary forests and peatland in an attempt to curtail deforestation and reduce greenhouse gases.

The moratorium, which resulted from an Indonesia–Norway bilateral agreement with a US$1 billion potential carbon transaction, will expire on May 20.

Forestry Minister Zulkifli Hasan has declared the moratorium a success, saying that the move has slowed the country’s deforestation rate to 450 hectares per year during 2010-2011 from 3.5 million hectares per year in the period of 1999-2002.

Indonesia has pledged to cut back its carbon emissions by 26 percent from the current 2.1 gigatons of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) by 2020, and by 2012 Indonesia had cut 489 billion tons of CO2e or 16.57 percent of the target.

“Such progress shows that the country needs to continue the forest moratorium,” Zulkifli said in a speech read during a national seminar held in Jakarta on Tuesday, further emphasizing the government’s plan to go on with the moratorium.

A two-year moratorium was enough to curb deforestation and to lower carbon emissions, but an extension would only incur losses to palm plantation companies that had contributed much to the state income, Gapki’s director of law and advocacy Tungkot Sipayung said.

Tungkot said that the government should focus on protecting primary and conservation forests, and let loose the usage of peatland deemed as prospective palm plantation land.

“The moratorium will limit the opportunity to develop our country’s palm oil production. We already have a 1999 Forestry Law to monitor the matter, therefore a longer forest moratorium is not needed,” he said, adding that data gathered from various sources showed that peatland planted with palm could reduce carbon emissions more than peatland left dormant.

Gapki’s data is in contrast with research reports from various international institutions and environmental organizations that say emissions from logging and drainage on peatland have contributed significantly to Indonesia’s greenhouse gas emissions, including methane.

Palm plantation expansion has long been blamed for rampant deforestation, while high demand for palm oil has driven rapid forest loss in several areas such as in Sumatra and Kalimantan.

Indonesia, the world’s largest palm oil producer with an annual output of over 26 million tons, has been expanding its oil palm estates by 200,000 hectares a year, which are mostly developed by large companies.

This excerpt from a news article is courtesy of the Jakarta Post and can be read in its entirety here.

Aceh has world-renowned biodiversity, including critically endangered orangutans, rhinos, elephants and tigers. This change would also undermine its incalculable value as a major carbon sink.

Imagine an area nearly half the size of New Jersey suddenly cut to the ground.  Well, that’s exactly what is about to occur in Indonesia according to a report recently submitted to the Orangutan Conservancy.

A Canadian mining company announced Tuesday that it expects the governor of Sumatra’s Aceh province to allow it and other extractive industries to destroy 1.2 million hectares of valuable and currently protected rainforest.

The company, East Asian Minerals, claims in a press release to be working closely with government officials and to have staff in Aceh lobbying to reclassify large tracts of the province from “protected forest” to “production forest.”  The company’s website also states that it has hired a senior government official, former Golkar Deputy Chairman Fadel Muhammad “to help them with these efforts.”

Fadel, former Minister of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries and former Governor of Gorontalo Province, in addition to being the former Deputy Chairman of Indonesia’s’ Golkar Party, was re-named as a corruption suspect by the Attorney General’s office last week after several previous investigations over recent years. He is accused of misusing Rp 5.4 billion (US$ 567,000) from the 2001 provincial budget during his tenure as Gorontalo’s governor. Edward Rochette, the Canadian mining company’s CEO, said, “In his advisory role, Bapak Dr. Fadel will provide invaluable assistance to enable the projects in Indonesia to move forward in a timely and sustainable manner.” He appears either unaware or unconcerned regarding the charges facing Dr. Fadel.

“This spatial plan is being developed via a highly ‘unhealthy’ process, in which foreign corporations are intervening and driving local policy”, said Dedi Ratih, Spatial Planning Campaigner for WALHI  Indonesia (Friends of The Earth Indonesia) “Reclassification of these forests is clearly not in the best interests of Aceh’s local communities, but instead in the interests of massive natural resources exploitation. This plan should be rejected immediately”

Opening these areas to mining, logging, and palm oil production would have disastrous consequences for the people of Aceh and huge areas of rainforest habitat of global importance for its exceptional biodiversity. These forests are home to critically endangered Sumatran orangutans, tigers, rhinos and elephants.

“This world renowned protected area -the Leuser Ecosystem – is the only place on earth where orangutans, rhinos, tigers and elephants are found side by side and the least real hope for the survival of viable populations of each of them. Not to mention the myriad of other threatened species residing there” said Dr Ian Singleton, director of the Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Programme. “If these plans proceed, their future is in immediate jeopardy.”
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