No more hot spots, say Riau officials

But environment activists say fires will recur as big firms fuel demand for land
Wahyudi Soeriaatmadja, Straits Times 27 Oct 10;

BENGKALIS REGENCY (RIAU PROVINCE): After days of fierce firefighting, aided by rain, the local authorities said on Monday that their satellite data showed that there were no longer any hot spots in the province.

But the National Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency - which has an office in the provincial capital of Pekanbaru - said it would keep monitoring the situation to see if all fires had really been extinguished.

Environmental activists, however, said that the scenario of raging fires resulting in choking haze would keep recurring each year, as long as cultivation activities on Riau's peat lands continued unabated.

Several giants in the oil palm and the pulp and paper industry own concessions either directly or through their subsidiaries throughout Riau province. They include Singapore-based companies like Wilmar International, Sinar Mas Group and Asia Pacific Resources International.

Activists say their activities have influenced local farmers to move from traditional crops to a more lucrative one - oil palm.

'When big companies come in and open a plantation, build the infrastructure - the canals and access roads - they attract local farmers to open their own plantations, as they can use the same infrastructure,' said Mr Teddy Hardiansyah, executive director of the Riau Haze Foundation.

Without proper supervision from the local authorities - who are in charge of issuing permits for the cultivation of land - local farmers end up using the land 'destructively', he said.

Activists place part of the blame for the fires on the big companies, alleging that some of the fires took place within or near their plantations.

Mr Susanto Kurniawan, coordinator of the Network To Save The Riau Forest, said that large companies have been known to conform to the 'no-burning policy' in principle, by hiring contractors to clear the land for them.

These contractors subsequently hire villagers who end up starting the fires.

'But because there was no evidence linking their actions to the management of the companies who issued the order, the courts let the companies get away with it,' said Mr Susanto.

The companies have refuted these claims. Mr Nurul Huda, the spokesman for PT Arara Abadi, which is affiliated to Sinar Mas, said the fires had not taken place within the company's plantation area.

'The fires were in the plantations owned by local residents. Although the fire was not within our concession area, we still helped to put out the flames by deploying 80 people and one helicopter,' he said.

Wilmar said it had a 'strict zero-burn policy' for its global operations and was committed to the growth and use of sustainable palm oil.

Sinar Mas subsidiary PT Smart said it was 'absolutely against burning'. Its president director Daud Dharsono said: 'Our contractors who clear the land must comply with our zero-burning policy. We clear only degraded land using... excavators and bulldozers.'

The company, he added, had also stepped up surveillance and ensured it had enough firefighting equipment during the dry season.

Activists also said the local authorities could do more, by taking measures that were simple but able to make a deep impact. Said Mr Susanto: 'So far the government has only been reacting to the fires and not preventing them.'

He and other activists suggested banning cultivation in areas where the peat is more than 3m deep, and revoking licences of landowners who have repeatedly set fires. Said Riau Haze Foundation's Mr Teddy: 'Riau has haze caused by fires every year. It is just a question of how many. And often, the location of the hot spots is the same each year. It is clear that these are repeat offenders.'

At a ministerial meeting in Japan yesterday, Singapore's Ambassador-at-large and adviser to Senior Minister S. Jayakumar, Mr Chew Tai Soo, noted that 'unsustainable' land clearing practices have resulted in frequent cases of haze that have hit the region and affected public health and the economies of affected countries.

'Regional cooperation to overcome this problem has shown some benefits in the past and should be stepped up,' he added.

2,000 ha of peatland in Bengkalis catches fire
Adianto P. Simamora, The Jakarta Post 27 Oct 10;

An investigation team found the recent smog blanketing Singapore and Malaysia originated from peatland belonging to farmers in Bengkalis, Riau province.

The fires burned more than 2,000 hectares of fire-prone peatland areas, which had been converted for business purposes, the investigation found.

The investigation was conducted by the Environment Ministry in Dusun Sejati village, Bengkalis, after neighboring Singapore and Malaysia complained about haze from Indonesia.

The team, however, did not investigate fires in other regencies in Riau, which activists said occurred in concession areas of oil-palm plantation and industrial forest concession (HTI).

Environment Ministry deputy minister for environmental damage, Arief Yuwono, said the fires spread out of control due to poor preventive measures taken by local administrations. “We recommend civil service investigators to find the main actors of fires [in Bengkalis],” he said.

The team also advised the need for further investigation to determine if fires also took place in oil-palm plantations and industrial forest concessions (HTI) in Riau province.

Analysis by WWF Indonesia revealed that the fires were still rampant in both HTI concessions and oil-palm plantation areas.

“Forty-one percent of fires occur in local people’s farms but the remaining were found in concession areas belonging to oil-palm plantations and HTI in Riau,” head of forest fires at WFF, Hariri Dedi told The Jakarta Post on Tuesday.

“The some hotspots in HTI were recorded in areas encroached on by local people. It shows HTI holders neglect their concession areas,” he said.

Environment Minister Gusti Muhammad Hatta earlier pointed out most fires in Bengkalis were set by local farmers practicing the slash-and-burn technique.

The team had found no hotspots in Bengkalis since Sunday.

Riau is one of the 10 most fire-prone provinces in the country where haze is usually thick in dry seasons. Other vulnerable provinces to fires are Jambi, South Sumatra, North Sumatra, Central Kalimantan and West Kalimantan.

The government has promised the international community to cut emissions by 26 percent in 2020 by slashing 20 percent of hotspots annually.


Haze outlook in Singapore still up in the air
Straits Times 27 Oct 10;

THE skies over Singapore may be clear now, but there is uncertainty over whether the smog could return.

Experts told The Straits Times yesterday that it was impossible to say for sure.

'Everyone would like a definitive answer, but life is not so simple,' said Nanyang Technological University climate expert Koh Tieh Yong. 'Anyone who can give you a definitive long-term prediction is not being honest.'

At the heart of the problem, he explained, is the sheer unpredictability of the two factors determining the occurrence of haze - burning in Indonesia and the direction of the wind.

Predicting wind patterns is difficult because Singapore is currently between monsoons.

Weather patterns this year are also not always comparable to years before.

Mr Landy Eng, the managing director of Conservation International Singapore, noted that this year's dry season has been unusually wet.

Predicting whether another fire will start in Sumatra is an entirely different affair, and trickier by far.

Said Prof Koh: 'The burning season is ending, but who is to say they won't start another fire?'

Mr Eng agreed: 'You don't know how many more smallholders are out there trying to clear their fields. Just because one crop of fires has ended doesn't mean the burning is done.'

He added that the longer the range of a forecast, the more chance there is of it being wrong.

Indeed, the National Environment Agency (NEA) has thus far not made any long-term predictions.

Yesterday, it said transboundary smoke haze was unlikely over the next few days as showers are expected in the region, and that no significant smoke plumes are expected in Sumatra.

Latest satellite images over cloud-free areas show only one hot spot in North Sumatra and none in Riau and Jambi. The NEA said rain had help put out some fires there.

JEREMY AU YONG AND GRACE CHUA

Singapore should be haze-free for the next few days, says NEA
Wayne Chan Channel NewsAsia 26 Oct 10;

SINGAPORE: The National Environment Agency says Singapore should be haze-free for the next few days, with showers expected in the region and no significant smoke plumes expected in Sumatra.

However, brief periods of slight haze may be possible in the early morning due to the accumulation of particulate matter under light wind conditions.

The NEA added that the latest satellite image over cloud-free areas showed that only one hotspot was detected in north Sumatra and no hotspots or smoke plumes were detected in Riau and Jambi.

The showers in the region have helped to put out some of the fires there.

The 24-hour PSI as of 4pm on Tuesday was 35.

NEA added that winds over the next two days are expected to be westerly to northwesterly, with showers expected in the late morning and afternoon on Wednesday and Thursday.

-CNA/ac

Regional cooperation to overcome haze problem has shown benefits
Channel NewsAsia 26 Oct 10;

NAGOYA, Japan: Singapore believes that regional cooperation to overcome the problem of transboundary haze has shown some benefits and should be stepped up.

Ambassador-at-Large Mr Chew Tai Soo said this on Tuesday at a United Nations Conference in Nagoya, Japan, on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Foreign Degradation (REDD).

The Ambassador, who is also an Advisor to Senior Minister S Jayakumar, said Singapore is pleased that countries with little or no forests such as Singapore can also contribute to the efforts.

He added that Singapore takes the issue of uncontrolled deforestation seriously.

Deforestation in Indonesia had caused the Pollutant Standards Index (PSI) to plummet into the unhealthy range in large parts of Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore last week.

The Ambassador said the transboundary haze affected public health, tourism, transportation and the economies of affected countries.

Deforestation accounts for approximately 20 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions.

-CNA/ac