Indonesia won't allow oil palm growers to cut primary forests for establishing plantations, State Minister for Environment Rachmat Witoelar said. Indonesia is trying to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, 75% of which result from deforestation. The country is set to overtake Malaysia this year as the world's largest palm oil supplier and plans to add 1.5 million hectares of the crop over the next three years, the government said.

The Finance Ministry's Directorate General of Taxation officially starts operating "one-stop-shop" tax offices Tuesday in line with the ministry's mission to "modernize" the service by next year. The new offices, called "Pratama Tax Service Offices", will offer taxpayers more convenience as they will be able to pay various kinds of taxes, including value-added tax, income tax, and land and building tax, under one roof, Director General Darmin Nasution said Monday during a media conference.

PT Bakrie & Brothers has finally received the green light from the government to continue work on its US$1.26 billion gas pipeline linking East Kalimantan and Central Java, despite earlier uncertainty over the gas supply for the project. Downstream Oil and Gas Regulatory Agency (BPH Migas) chairman Tubagus Haryono said last week that the project would go ahead in line with the original schedule as there were no longer doubts over the gas supply for the country's longest pipeline project.

The country's fourth largest CDMA-based cellular operator, Mobile-8 Telecom, has completed the merger of three of its subsidiaries, PT Komunikasi Selular Indonesia (Komselindo), PT Metro Selular Nusantara (Metrosel) and PT Telekomindo Selular Raya (Telesera), to reduce operating costs.