Greenpeace Indonesia has asked the government to firmly carry out its commitment of forest moratorium because thousands of hectares of premier and secondary forests in Indonesia do not have legal protection.
“The Government of Indonesia has a commitment to keep the forest, but the big question is whether the commitment is put into effect or not,” Greenpeace Indonesia Forest Campaigner Yuyun Indradi said here on Sunday.
He noted that based on Greenpeace International`s analysis of the government`s recent revision of its forest moratorium map (PIPIB), more than 10 million hectares of premier forests and around 32 million hectares of secondary forests in Indonesia still do not have any legal protection.
“The forest moratorium map is revised every six months, but the problem that find is that the map sometimes seizes the moratorium area,” Yuyun said.
He said that based on best available data, the forest moratorium overlaps with 5.5 million hectares that have been granted as concession areas for development to pulp wood or oil palm plantations, selective logging or mining.
He also said that more than 600,000 hectares of peat land and premier and secondary forests were rich in carbon content but they have been excluded from the latest moratorium map.
Yuyun pointed out that the total decline in the legally protected forest area under the moratorium since 2011 has reached 6 million hectares.
Such a condition, according to him, was vividly contrary to the commitment of the President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono who earlier told Greenpeace Indonesia to try harder to strengthen environmental protection.
Therefore, he has asked the government to review the existing concessions, to increase transparency in the way the licenses are granted, to establish a credible database of low-carbon land as an alternative to the current destruction of the high-carbon land, and to undertake clear spatial and land use planning.
