Indonesia says it won't revoke existing forestry licenses

Niluksi Koswanage Yogyakarta in Reuters: Indonesia won't revoke existing forestry licenses for palm oil firms as part of a deal with Norway to preserve rain forests, a government minister and industry official said on Wednesday.

Chief Economic Minister Hatta Rajasa told reporters that the government had no intention of limiting the expansion of the $15-billion Indonesian palm oil industry, although it was committed to slowing deforestation. "We want to keep to our targets of 40 million tonnes of crude palm oil," he said on the sidelines of an industry conference in Java. "We will not take away the existing licenses."

The country plans to produce 21-23 million tonnes of palm oil this year. "We have food security interests and our export earnings to protect but expansion will be at a sustainable pace for our future generations," Rajasa added.

A two-year commitment to halt new concessions to the industry for the conversion of rainforests and peatlands will go on as planned under the Norwegian deal signed last week, Indonesian Palm Oil Board Vice Chairman Derom Bangun said….

An Indonesian forest from 1940, from the Tropenmuseum collection on Wikimedia Commons