Government intensifies forest protection ahead of CGI talks

Government intensifies forest protection ahead of CGI talks

JAKARTA (JP): Coordinating Minister for the Economy Rizal
Ramli said on Friday that the government would step up measures
to protect the country's tropical rain forests ahead of a key
donors meeting next month.

Rizal said that forestry conservation had been a major issue
at last year's Consultative Group on Indonesia (CGI) meeting in
Tokyo.

"If we don't make preparations, this will become a serious
problem at the upcoming pre-CGI meeting," he told a press
conference following a meeting with the Interdepartmental
Committee on Forestry (IDCF).

Indonesia's major sovereign donors and institutions are
grouped in the CGI, which last year pledged more than US$5
billion in loans.

The pre-CGI meeting of donors representatives in Jakarta will
be held on April 23-24, prior to the CGI meeting itself in
October or November, the venue for which has not yet been decided
upon.

Rizal said that the measures that must be immediately
implemented included heavier sanctions against illegal logging
and smuggling, preventing regional governments from being
overeager in issuing licenses for logging, and making
preparations for forest-fire prevention and containment.

Rizal said that the sanctions against illegal loggers had been
relatively weak in the past and this had only encouraged more
illegal logging.

"We have asked the Attorney General's Office, the police and
the Ministry of Justice to take tougher action," he explained.

Rizal said that in a bid to help curb the smuggling of
Indonesian logs overseas, the IDCF team would undertake a study
to quantify the actual losses suffered by the country from such
smuggling.

"Many of our logs are smuggled to Malaysia and China," he
said.

He also said that the IDCF team would conduct a study to
identify how much forest land should be protected from logging in
each province and district.

"In the current circumstances, the regional administrations
are very aggressive in issuing licenses for logging activities.
This is highly dangerous," he said.

He added that the IDCF would announce in major newspapers
every three months which provinces or districts were suffering
the most from illegal logging.

Rizal also explained that fighting forest fires was very
important because the country was suffering around US$4 billion
in losses due to the problem annually.

He said that with the El Nino weather phenomenon expected to
make itself felt again soon, the forest fire problem would become
more serious.

"We'll announce the hot spots to the public," he said.

Elsewhere, Rizal said that the government was holding
discussions with a German creditor to ease the debts of private
forest concession holders worth some US$23.6 million in return
for turning some forests into conservation areas.

"If this works, the scheme will also be applied to other
foreign creditors," he added.

He said that another program was to consolidate the country's
plywood industry, which was believed to already be suffering from
overcapacity, exceeding the ability of the country's forests to
supply the necessary logs.

He added that the government would also require indebted
forest concession companies under the stewardship of the
Indonesian Bank Restructuring Agency (IBRA) to come up with
forest conservation management strategies as a condition for the
restructuring of their debts.(rei)