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Indonesia tackles clean-up in palm oil head on
The plantations are deforesting and destroying habitats and ecosystems.
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Orangutan in the branches above the feeding station at Tanjung Puting National Park, Central Kalimantan. (Shutterstock/File)
P
resident Joko “Jokowi” Widodo recently took his strongest action yet to tackle one of the biggest problems that has been plaguing the country: unsustainable palm oil.
Among the most pressing problems in the palm oil sector is a lack of good governance, marked by the illegal expansion of palm plantations into forest areas, irrespective of whether they are conservation or protected areas, including national parks such as Tesso Nilo in Riau and Sebangau in Central Kalimantan.
The plantations are deforesting and destroying habitats and ecosystems and are directly responsible for the rapid demise of Indonesia’s most iconic species of elephant, orangutan, rhino and tiger. These excesses have caused widespread condemnation of palm oil in many markets of a world that now more than ever is sensitive to the effects of climate change and other environmental impacts. A trend to label food products as being palm oil-free is spreading widely to increase their marketability.
Rather than continuing to rely on promotional campaigns and threats to promote Indonesian palm oil and tackle the oil’s image issue with PR, as has been the industry’s business as usual, this time, the President has done the right thing by tackling the core problem — weak governance — head on.
