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Govt delays peatland regulation after Oslo talks
The government has delayed its deliberation of a much-awaited draft regulation on peatland protection, pending for a presidential decree on efforts to halt the country’s peatland conversion
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he government has delayed its deliberation of a much-awaited draft regulation on peatland protection, pending for a presidential decree on efforts to halt the country’s peatland conversion.
The delay was made after Indonesia and Norway signed a US$1 billion deal to avert the deforestation rate in forest and peatland areas in a bid to slash emissions as part of climate change control.
Deputy minister for environmental damage controlling at the Environment Ministry Masnellyarti Hilman said the draft regulation was now at the State Secretary office waiting for approval from President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
“For the time being, its deliberation is postponed. We will see the moratorium regulated by the presidential decree,” she told reporters on the sidelines of biodiversity dialogue Tuesday. “We may also adopt a moratorium policy under the government regulation.”
The draft regulation on peatland, created to implement the 2009 Environmental Law, still allowed businesspeople to utilize peat land areas with depth of less than 3 meters.
The draft says activities including pasture, plantations, fisheries, residential, mining and transmigration areas could still run businesses.
The ministry says that the total ban on peatland is wrong because a number of cities in Kalimantan and Riau stand on peatland.
The draft says peat domes with a depth of more than 3 meters will be categorized as protected areas.
President Yudhoyono made a statement in Norway last week to impose a two-year moratorium on new activities in the peatland areas.
It is not clear yet on whether the moratorium has been discussed before he made the trip to Norway.
A senior official at the Forestry Ministry, Haryadi Himawan, suspected the decision on the moratorium was spontaneously made in Norway out of concern about rife conversion of peatland.
“I don’t know exactly when the idea of the moratorium began and why it should be in two years. I have never heard discussions in Jakarta before [the Oslo meeting],” he said.
He admitted the government had not yet set criteria on peatland, which should be closed for new activities.
He said that a presidential decree was needed to bind local administrations from governors to regents to obey the President’s order on a moratorium. Indonesia has around 21 million hectares of peatland.
Papua has 8 million hectares, Sumatra 7.2 million and Kalimantan 5.8 million.
A number of plantations currently operate on peatland. With climate change now a serious topic worldwide, talks have stepped up to impose a moratorium on the conversion of peat land, which is believed to contain a huge stock of carbon dioxide, the main contributor of global warming. Years
before the Oslo meeting, the Indonesian Environmental Forum demanded a forest and peatland moratorium. The government rejected it on the claim of economic losses.
It is not clear yet on whether the moratorium has been discussed before he made the trip to Norway.
