Logging moratorium in production, industrial forest impossible

Adianto P. Simamora, The Jakarta Post 2 Dec 09;

Indonesia will not be able to impose a logging moratorium on production and industrial forests, a study by the Greenomics Indonesia said.

A study showed Indonesia needed at least Rp75.2 trillion (US$7.5 billion) to compensate potential costs from stopping logging activities in 110 forest production companies (HPH) and 77 industrial forest firms (HTI).

“Potential losses of logging moratorium are too high. It is impossible to implement it,” Greenomics executive director Elfian Effendi said Wednesday.

Greenomics calculated the potential losses based on the price of wood to be logged from the HPH and HTI companies, which had secured licenses from government to cut the trees until 2018.

Elfian said that the forest moratorium would also cause multiplier effects because the HPH and HTI employed thousands of workers.

The 187 companies (HPH and HTI), which operated in 7.58 million hectares of forest, planned to log trees in the areas of 1.48 million hectares until 2018 with the expected output of 79.69 million cubic meters of woods.