Posted on 23 May 2011
Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono
has signed a presidential decree that bans
logging of 64 million hectares of carbon-rich
primary forests and peatlands and suspends
the granting of new permits for clearing
these lands for two years.
The moratorium signed
late last week, which goes into effect immediately,
is part of an agreement worth US$1 billion
between Indonesia and Norway aimed at reducing
the country’s greenhouse gas emissions from
deforestation and forest degradation. Indonesia
has vowed to cut its emissions by 26 percent
from business-as-usual levels by 2020, or
by 41 percent with sufficient international
support.
“WWF recognizes the
two-year ban on logging and clearing of
primary forests and peatlands as a foundation
for Indonesia’s ambitious shift towards
a low carbon economy,” said Dr. Efransjah,
CEO of WWF-Indonesia.
President Yudhoyono
announced plans to reduce forest loss by
moving economic development practices, such
as pulp and palm oil plantations, onto degraded
lands at the Business for the Environment
Global Summit in April of this year. "The
government can now shift its focus to the
bolder steps necessary to protect high carbon
stocks found in secondary forests, as well
as their biodiversity and cultural values.”
According to a WWF analysis,
the moratorium will extend protection to
only an additional 14 per cent of primary
forests, as the majority of Indonesia's
primary forests are already protected by
law. The potential emissions reductions
from land use, land-use change and forestry
could be far greater under this decree if
the moratorium was extended beyond primary
forests to include secondary forests as
well, said WWF.
“Because concessions
can continue being awarded in secondary
forests, the moratorium’s impact will be
limited as it will reduce deforestation
and cut carbon emissions by only about 4
percent,” said Nazir Foead, Director of
WWF-Indonesia. “There is clearly much more
that must be done if Indonesia is to achieve
its ambitious emissions reduction targets.”
Still, the moratorium
could be an opportunity to help put in place
effective forest governance and sound ecosystem-based
spatial planning, particularly in settling
overlapping land-uses. WWF is calling on
Ministries and other government agencies
to use the two-year period of the moratorium
to review and improve governance on issuing
licenses to industrial timber plantations,
agro-industrial plantations and mining in
secondary forests and other land uses. Strengthening
the analysis of ecological and cultural
values in these forests could contribute
to this, said WWF.
“We must absolutely
make the most of these two years to strengthen
this commitment from Indonesia, so that
it indeed catalyses the international community
to address deforestation,” said Rasmus Hansson,
CEO of WWF Norway and chair of WWF’s global
Forest and Climate Initiative. “The Norwegian
government and other donor countries must
step forward and support Indonesia’s efforts
to advance the conservation, sustainable
management and enhancement of these globally
significant forests.”
