[Nasional-e] Loss from oil palm estates

[Ambon]

The Jakarta Post
Oct. 10, 2002

Loss from oil palm estates
E.G. Togu Manurung, Director Forest Watch Indonesia, Bogor, West Java

Oil palms, which produce palm oil and palm kernel, are among the main
products of the country's plantations and are a source of the country's
non-oil-and-gas foreign exchange. The bright prospects for palm oil in the
world's vegetable oil trade have encouraged the government to expand the oil
palm plantation area. In 14 years there has been an increase of 2.35 million
hectares in oil palm plantations, from 606,780 ha in 1986 to nearly three
million hectares in 1999.
This growth is inseparable from government incentives, particularly the
licensing facility and subsidy for investments in the development of
small-holder plantations and in the opening of new territories for private
plantation areas.
The growth of this industry has led to economic benefits, but this has
increased the threat to our tropical natural forests -- expansion is chiefly
taking place in conversion forests.
The conversion of natural forests for oil palm plantations continues despite
some 50 million ha of critical and abandoned land -- as a result of the
opening and/or exploitation of forest for various purposes.
Investors prefer to develop these oil palm plantations in conversion forests
because of the large profits acquired in the form of Wood Utilization
Permits (IPK) from natural forest areas converted into oil palm plantations.
IPK wood is badly needed, especially by the pulp and paper industry;
particularly after the decrease of log production in natural forests.
According to the Directorate General of Forest Inventory and Land Use
Planning, as of March 1998 forest area about to be approved for conversion
to plantations reached 8,204,524 hectares, while approved areas of a little
over four million ha included limited forest production area, permanent
production forest area, and convertible production forest area.
Thus, forest conversion for oil palm plantations has become a source of
deforestation. This also threatens biodiversity in the tropical rain forest
ecosystem and also our wildlife. The rate of our deforestation from 1985 to
1998 was no less than 1.7 million hectares per year. Deforestation now
reaches an average of more than two million hectares per year. Worse, oil
palm plantations have also been created in protected forests.
Converting a natural forest into oil palm plantations has often proven to be
a major cause of forest and land fires here; land clearance for oil palm
plantations is often done using the burning method because the process is
quick and cheap.
The underlying cause of most forest fires has been identified as deliberate
human action apart from long droughts due to the El Ni¤o weather phenomenon,
and land conflicts between plantation companies and communities.
The impacts of the conversion of natural forest into oil palm plantations
include the rise of pests owing to the monoculture feature of the
plantations, changes in the flow of ground surface water and increased land
erosion and pollution due to much use of fertilizers and pesticides.
Unreasonable land compensation has often caused problems with local
communities, which becomes a source of risk and uncertainty for oil palm
plantation companies.
The plantations are indeed capable of creating new jobs, while world demand
for vegetable oil and the various derivative products of palm oil continues
to increase.
But given the greater loss of natural resources the government should halt
the conversion of natural forest into oil palm plantations due to their
contribution to deforestation. The 30 million hectares of critical and/or
abandoned land should be utilized to the maximum, which could include the
development of oil palm plantations.
The government must also apply harsh and clear sanctions for those actors in
forest conversion, including those who receive the greatest benefit from
having rights to concessions but who abandon the land, creating new shrub
land or marginal land.
The law must be also be enforced regarding companies that use fire to clear
land. A more proactive approach including a public consultancy mechanism,
should be used to resolve land conflicts between local communities and
forest concessionaires.
E.G. Togu Manurung, Ph.D. teaches at the School of Forestry at the Bogor
Institute of Agriculture (IPB).