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Indonesia slams EU for using old data as basis for regulation
Ruandha Agung Sugardiman, the Environment and Forestry Ministry’s director general of climate change control, said the EU had made a risky move by basing such a pivotal decision on “outdated” data
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This aerial photo taken on March 3, 2018 shows a protected area of the Rawa Singkil wildlife reserve as part of the Leuser Ecosystem in Trumon, South Aceh, which is being burnt in preparation for the opening of a new palm oil plantation. (AFP/Januar)
T
he government has further criticized the European Union’s plan to restrict palm oil-based biofuels after the bloc said the constraint was based on data from 2015.
The EU’s representative office in Jakarta explained that the regulation, which was issued by the European Commission on March 13, was based on the best available scientific data from 2008 to 2015, which showed that palm oil was associated with the highest level of deforestation, with 45 percent of the expansion of oil palm plantations taking place in high carbon stock areas.
Ruandha Agung Sugardiman, the Environment and Forestry Ministry’s director general of climate change control, said the EU had made a risky move by basing such a pivotal decision on “outdated” data.
“How could they use outdated data when we already have data from 2016 to 2018? The data they use can’t represent the current condition of palm oil in Indonesia,” Ruandha told The Jakarta Post on Friday.
Relations between Jakarta and Brussels have suffered since last week’s issuance of the EU Commission’s regulation that is set to result in palm oil as the only commodity that to be capped over concerns of deforestation.
“Indeed, the productivity factor of palm oil is higher than that of other crops, but the factor used in the formula to determine [indirect land use change (ILUC)] is calculated based on the energy-content-of-traded-products of different annual crops such as soy, rapeseed and sunflower compared to palm oil,” the representative office said.
The reference period starts in 2008, because that year is the cut-off date contained in the EU sustainability criteria for biofuels, and 2015 provides the latest available consistent data.
