Its members, who include environmental NGOs, palm oil companies and global retailers, passed a resolution accepting that secondary and degraded (logged) forests could be classified as areas of  high conservation value if these areas were habitats for endangered species such as orangutans, Sumatran tigers and rhinos. This would mean that no company would receive RSPO certification if it were clearing these forests.

Scientists have proved that logged forests can still contain substantial amounts of biodiversity.

Orangutans, to name but one increasingly rare species, have been observed living in degraded forest areas.

Last week, the Forestry Ministry apparently smothered this idea before it could be put to any beneficial use by claiming that only primary forests and peatlands would be protected under the two year moratorium on the conversion of forests to palm oil plantations that is due to begin January 2011.

Once more, I have to ask myself: why does the Indonesian government seem to want to destroy the very ecological fabric that makes the country so unique and special — its once vast and ancient rainforests which boast a prolific array of wildlife sustained by these forests?

Why, instead, does it seek to become like virtually every other country in the world and ruin and wreck the wonderful gifts nature has bestowed upon Indonesia?  

I’m sure the majority of Indonesians themselves are furious with their government for its ceaseless plundering of the country’s natural attributes as the supposed only road to modernization.

It’s not too late to take a different, more environmentally-sensitive route, but it has to be taken now. 

Jeanie Elford

London

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