The deforestation price has soared in a protected space for Indigenous communities and critically endangered species in Indonesia, with a website almost half the dimensions of Singapore cleared over the previous three years, a report by a community of environmental teams has discovered.
The territory overlaps with the pulpwood and palm oil concessions of PT Mayawana Persada, which felled greater than 33,000 hectares (ha) of forest from 2021 to 2023, in line with a research titled Deforestation Nameless launched on 18 March by Greenpeace, Auriga, and Environmental Paper Community. This was a six-fold enhance over the earlier two years.
The report alleges that Mayawana Persada has ties with one of many world’s largest producers of wooden pulp and merchandise, Royal Golden Eagle (RGE). The accusation comes regardless of RGE having adopted a no-deforestation coverage since 2015.
In response to the findings, a assertion issued by RGE by means of its subsidiary APRIL mentioned that “RGE categorically refutes the existence of any hyperlinks between RGE and its shareholders and PT Mayawana Persada.”
“Present and future fibre provide to APRIL will likely be primarily sourced from its personal and suppliers’ concession the place any elevated fibre provide wants will likely be met from productiveness positive aspects pushed by important investments in analysis and improvement and greatest follow silviculture,” mentioned RGE.
The areas of pure forest which Mayawana Persada has cleared are being transformed into pulpwood plantations. As of the tip of 2023, Mayawana had established 45,187 ha of pulpwood plantations, primarily based on evaluation from satellite tv for pc imagery by geospatial firm TheTreeMap.
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There may hardly be a extra vital space to preserve, but it’s being cleared with terrifying velocity.
Arie Rompas, forest marketing campaign staff chief, Greenpeace Indonesia
Mayawana Persada’s forest clearing has intensified following an increase in world demand for wooden pellets, pulp and viscose for clothes, paper, tissue and packaging, mentioned the report.
Deforestation in PT Mayawana Persada’s concession, 2021-2023. Supply: Deforestation Nameless 2024 report
Indonesia is likely one of the world’s high exporters of wooden pellets, that are used instead gas supply as a consequence of their low value and excessive power effectivity, whereas the demand for viscose, which is marketed as an eco-friendly clothes choice, has soared.
Satellite tv for pc imagery reveals deforestation in PT Mayawana Persada’s concession, from 2001 to 2023. Supply: Nusantara Atlas/TheTreeMap, 2024.
Sacred land in danger
The massive-scale forest clearing carried out by Mayawana Persada has been inflicting battle between the corporate and the Dayak Indigenous Folks of Kualan Hilir, in line with the research.
Their ancestral lands overlap with 3,650 ha of the concession, prompting neighborhood leaders to make an settlement with Mayawana representatives to exclude components of their area from being developed for pulpwood plantations in 2020.
Two years later, neighborhood leaders claimed that, opposite to the settlement, Mayawana had cleared forests thought-about sacred by the Kualan Hilir neighborhood and agroforestry websites which might be vital to native livelihoods, learn the research. This led members of the Kualan Hilir neighborhood to impose customary sanctions and fines on the corporate in September 2022.
Indigenous communities in Kualan Hilir village in West Kalimantan province protest in opposition to the destruction of forests they contemplate sacred by PT Mayawana Persada, taken on 14 July 2023. Picture: Kualan Hilir neighborhood
Nevertheless, the report mentioned Mayawana Persada ignored the settlement and refused to pay the fines, prompting the Indigenous neighborhood to stage numerous protests.
Arie Rompas, forest marketing campaign staff chief at Greenpeace Indonesia, informed Eco-Enterprise: “The corporate’s deforestation is impacting culturally vital websites and conventional, sustainable livelihood sources of the Dayaks. Nothing is extra vital to Indigneous peoples than their conventional lands, and we consider this isn’t being revered by the corporate’s actions.”
Haven for endangered orangutans
The lowland forest ecosystem inside Mayawana’s concession gives habitat for a variety of plant and animal species, together with the critically endangered Bornean orangutan.
Some 49,208 ha of forest inside Mayawana’s concession space is appropriate habitat for the Bornean orangutan, in line with the Gunung Palung Orangutan Conservation Program (GPOCP), a conservation group that operates within the Mount Palung Nationwide Park.
The organisation conducts wildlife surveys within the village forests that border the Mayawana concession space, offering annual information on which species are current and how plentiful they’re. GPOCP has approached Mayawana to conduct surveys inside the corporate’s concession space, however as of October 2023, the corporate had not responded, the GPOCP mentioned within the report.
An estimated 61 Bornean orangutans dwell within the protected peat forest on Sungai Paduan. Picture: Greenpeace
GPOCP researchers estimate that 61 Bornean orangutans dwell within the space round Sungai Paduan, a protected peat forest, primarily based on observations of nests and calls and the provision of meals sources in that space. The 6,788 ha space consists principally of peat swamp rainforest and has been recognized as one of many pockets of orangutan populations.
The GPOCP 2022 survey signifies that 10 mammal species and 85 hen species dwell within the Sungai Paduan protected forest. GPOCP additionally discovered proof of different endangered and weak species dwelling inside or close to the concession boundaries, together with Bornean white-bearded gibbons, helmeted hornbills, and solar bears.
“The Mayawana concession neighbours the well-known Gunung Palung Nationwide Park and is a vital a part of a panorama that’s important to the survival possibilities of the critically endangered Borneo Orangutan. There may hardly be a extra vital space to preserve, but it’s being cleared with terrifying velocity,” mentioned Rompas.
The nameless beneficiary?
Mayawana Persada’s concession was held by Alas Kusuma, an organization that controls numerous forestry and oil palm firms in Indonesia.
As of January 2024, shares in Mayawana are usually not immediately owned by an individual or a gaggle of individuals, however quite, in equal components by two firms: Malaysian firm Inexperienced Ascend, and Hong-Kong headquartered Beihai Worldwide Group Restricted.
Each firms are domiciled within the British Virgin Islands and Samoa, respectively.
Neither of the islands present public entry to firm shareholder data which makes the identification of Mayawana’s final useful homeowners hidden, the report learn.
Inexperienced Ascend is linked to different anonymously backed firms with ties to Singapore-based paper and palm oil conglomerate RGE, owned by Indonesian billionaire Sukanto Tanoto.
This consists of the holding firms for a woodchip mill in East Kalimantan, PT Balikpapan Chip Lestari, which shipped wooden to RGE’s pulp mill in China, reported analysis in Could 2023 by the identical environmental organisations.
The Malaysian agency can be allegedly linked to holding firms for a brand new mega-scale pulp mill being developed in North Kalimantan, PT Phoenix Sources Worldwide, which is allegedly underneath the widespread management of RGE.
The Deforestation Nameless report claimed that the Malaysian agency can be linked to holding firms for a brand new mega-scale pulp mill being developed in North Kalimantan, PT Phoenix Sources Worldwide, which is allegedly underneath the widespread management of RGE.
Inexperienced Ascend likewise is alleged to have company officers who’ve served in different forestry firms with ties to RGE like PT Adindo Hutani Lestari, a pulpwood supplier in North Kalimantan which provides wooden to RGE’s pulp mill in Sumatra.
PT Mayawana Persada shared company officers with firms linked to RGE, in line with a report from NGOs. Supply: Deforestation Nameless 2024 report
In addition to its dedication to ‘zero deforestation’ in its operations and provide chain, RGE’s flagship pulp and paper firm APRIL has launched an enormous forest conservation challenge, a fire-free village community, and an knowledgeable working group on peatlands.
It has previously decade, together with different main Indonesian pulp firms, RGE has been accused by NGO teams of varied environmental and social points, such because the clearing of a whole lot of hundreds of hectares of forest, together with elephants and tiger habitat in Sumatra, together with the draining of carbon-rich peat forests which have led to the disastrous forest fires and haze which have plagued Indonesia over the previous few many years.
