Indonesia halts new palm oil plantation development

JAKARTA: Indonesia’s president has signed a moratorium on all new palm oil plantation development, an official said Thursday, in a move hailed by environmentalists.

The moratorium effectively halts any new land being made available for plantations in the world’s top producer of the edible vegetable oil, a key ingredient in many everyday goods, from biscuits to shampoo and make-up.

President Joko Widodo signed the instruction, which will last three years, on Wednesday, Prabianto Mukti Wibowo, a deputy minister at the Coordinating Ministry for Economic Affairs, told AFP.

“(The moratorium) is to improve the governance of sustainable palm oil plantations, provide legal certainty, increase the productivity of smallholder palm oil plantations, maintain environmental sustainability and contribute to the reduction in greenhouse gases,” he told AFP in a WhatsApp message.

Plantations on Sumatra island, Papua and the Indonesian part of Borneo have expanded in recent years as demand for palm oil has skyrocketed, bringing huge profits to companies and healthy tax revenues to the government.

But the rapid growth has been blamed for the destruction of tropical forests that are home to many endangered species, and forest fires that occur every year during the dry season due to illegal slash-and-burn clearance.

The Indonesian Forum for the Environment, Walhi, welcomed the moratorium.

“The presidential instruction is a good first step in restructuring natural resource management, especially in the palm oil sector,” it said in a statement, adding ideally it would be in place for 25 years.

The moratorium was first proposed in 2015, following devastating blazes that cloaked large stretches of Southeast Asia in toxic smog for weeks.

A moratorium on conversions of new peat lands was established in 2011 to improve management and reduce fires, but campaigners say this is sometimes ignored when local governments grant concessions.

Poor spatial data and overlapping forestry maps are a major hindrance for authorities trying to enforce regulations governing them.

— AFP photo Thick smoke from land fire is pictured in Ogan Ilir, South Sumatra on September 17. Fires due to “slash and burn” farming methods and the dry season, have been burning across South Sumatra and Riau province since July.