INDONESIA: Jakarta wants to lead world in reducing deforestation
Updated
Indonesia says it wants to make a difference to climate change by saving the world's tropical forests. Jakarta says it wants to take the lead in helping to reduce deforestation.
Presenter: Linda LoPresti
Speakers: Indonesian Foreign Minister Dr Hassan Wirajuda
LOPRESTI: Indonesia's environmental problems are big. There's air pollution, water pollution, reef degradation and then there are the disappearing forests.
The cause, according to the Environment Ministry, is illegal logging. It's one of the biggest problems facing the country. The slash and burn tactics only add to the already high level of emissions from industry and cars.
But there's also the rainforests. Losing the lush tracts of land also means elephants and endangered tigers lose their homes. The environmental impact is huge.
Now Jakarta says it wants to take a stand. Foreign Minister Dr Hassan Wirajuda says Indonesia will forge partnerships with developed and developing countries to save the world's tropical forests.
WIRAJUDA: We see the importance of forging partnerships with the developed countries, sustainable forest management and in this regard tropical and rainforest countries certainly are hopeful that we could get more incentives and be that in the form of financial support and technology, particularly clean technology.
LOPRESTI: Emissions from forestry account for about a fifth of the world's greenhouse gas emissions, the vast majority from Indonesia and Brazil.
Last week Jakarta imposed moratoriums on logging in the provinces of Aceh and Papua.
But more needs to be done..
Outside the convention centre, environmental activists are doing their bit to put forestation on the agenda of the Bali talks.
NORM: My name is Norm Fale(?) and I'm from the Friends of the National Park Foundation in Ubud, Bali.
LOPRESTI: Norm and his friends from Seeds for Bali are trying to make a difference by trying to reforest the Indonesian island of Nusa Pedina, 15 kilometres off the coast of Bali.
NORM: We want to provide an improved habitat for the wildlife that already lives there, we want to provide sustainable agri-forestry for the villagers on Nusa Pedina, and we want to provide a reserve virgin forest for environmental reasons. All three things are possible.
LOPRESTI: How will you do that?
NORM: We already have some planting that's taken place, we have 100 hectares of land allocated to us by the regional government, the local temples which are so important to Balinese life have allocated land and their support to the project, and most importantly all 35 villages on the island of Nusa Pedina have customary law that will protect the wildlife and protect the habitat and therefore protect the forest. We will achieve this by planting a range of trees, some for agri-forestry, some for virgin forest. We will double plant to make sure that the trees survive. We'll provide a watering system, we'll provide five years of maintenance to make sure that the forest does work. And we intend to make Nusa Pedina a showpiece of a balanced environmentally friendly development for the rest of the world to follow we hope.
TALENT: My name is Katut Sajuriwan, Balinese. I think the governments already did a lot about this but many of them are not ... what happened here in Indonesia, so then they tried to make more progress on that.
NORM: In recent years Indonesian governments have been taking the right steps to improve the situation, vis-a-vis illegal logging.
LOPRESTI: Yet they haven't convicted one illegal logging baron?
NORM: Probably not, the illegal logging barons tend not to be Indonesian for one thing and the problem in terms of some of the Islands, like the island of Borneo or Kalimantan is basically it's the problem of balancing the developments of sustainable industries for the local community against the need for environmental reasons. Unfortunately over the years the balance has tipped too far and now you'll find far more plantations scattered all through the island of Borneo, far too many. And they're not productive and they're not supportive of the local economy. And the government has taken steps to reduce that and to their credit that is happening.
LOPRESTI: Despite Indonesia and Brazil's push to put deforestation on the agenda of the Bali talks, it's still unclear whether Friday's mandate will include programs to reduced deforestation in a post Kyoto climate treaty.
Either way, Indonesia says it's not taking any chances. Foeign Minister Hassan Wirajuda.
WIRAJUDA: We hope that we would get more bilateral cooperation but we've been working also with the World Bank and other countries which have expressed their interest on the reforestation projects. In other words there's something practical we can do without waiting for the second framework of cooperation to be concluded.
LOPRESTI: Indonesia has already begun making it's own bilateral deals, a move it hopes to continue well into 2009 and beyond when the next big round of climate change talks are held in Copenhagen.
