Global Courant
JAKARTA – In Indonesia, home to a third of the world’s rainforests, annual deforestation has fallen by 8.4 percent, the environment ministry said Monday.
According to the latest available data, Indonesia recorded 104,000 hectares of deforested area between July 2021 and June 2022, up from 113,500 hectares in the previous year, according to government figures, which do not include current year figures.
“One of the most important measures is to restrict new (cultivation) permits for old-growth forest and peatland,” Belinda Margono, an official from the Ministry of the Environment, told reporters.
With the world’s third largest rainforest area after Brazil and the Congo, Indonesia is closely watched by environmentalists and has famously reneged on a global pledge by more than 130 countries to end deforestation by 2030, which they inappropriately and called dishonest.
It advocates replanting programs instead.
Indonesia is also the world’s largest producer of palm oil, which is associated with land clearing.
More forest land is expected to be taken as the government tries to attract large investments to the nickel and electric vehicle sectors.
The country is prone to wildfires, which the government says are often started by farmers to clear land, but spread uncontrollably, especially during the dry season.
However, Greenpeace Indonesia questioned the government data released Monday, including the methodology, which it said was flawed because it did not include forest cleared for industrial purposes.
“This explains why the deforestation rate is low,” said Arie Rompas, Greenpeace Indonesia’s forest activist, who believes the loss is significantly greater.
When asked why industrial land was not included, Ms Belinda from the Ministry of the Environment said replanting in those areas meant there was no net loss of forest.
According to Nusantara Atlas, an independent organization that tracks deforestation and wildfires, Indonesia’s forest loss was 208,250 ha in calendar year 2022 and 174,640 ha in 2021, a 16 percent increase in forest loss.
The government data tracks deforestation from July to June of the following year. REUTERS
