Indonesia has already signed bilateral deals with Singapore and Malaysia
Lee U-Wen Business Times 18 Feb 11;
INDONESIA is committed to ratifying the trans-boundary haze agreement in South-east Asia, with a view to getting the proposal approved in parliament by the end of this year.
This was revealed by Singapore's Environment and Water Resources Minister Yaacob Ibrahim, who was speaking to reporters after the latest meeting of the sub-regional ministerial steering committee on trans-boundary haze pollution yesterday.
Indonesia is this year's Asean chairman and the only country left in the region that has not yet endorsed the haze agreement - first introduced in 2002 - after the Philippines did so last year.
'(Indonesia) is planning to go through the due process of going to parliament. We welcome the news from them and we look forward to the ratification as soon as possible,' said Dr Yaacob, who chaired the media conference at the Shangri- La Hotel along with his counterparts from Brunei, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Thailand.
The Indonesian government had previously tried to seek House of Representatives approval to ratify the agreement back in 2008 as they argued that the treaty had to include illegal logging as part of the goal to prevent Asean countries from accepting wood taken illegally from Indonesian forests.
Indonesia is the largest forest nation in the region with 120 million hectares of rainforest.
Forest fires during the annual dry season have caused haze to blow toward neighbouring countries, leading to protests by Singapore and Malaysia leaders calling for Indonesia to clamp down hard on those responsible.
The haze is again expected to resurface in the second half of this year.
Indonesia has already signed bilateral deals with Singapore and Malaysia, with the two countries promising to help Indonesia stop land and forest fires.
Indonesia's State Minister for the Environment Gusti Muhammad Hatta said that his ministry was sticking to the target of reducing the number of hotspots by 20 per cent each year to meet Indonesia's pledge to bring down its emissions by 26 per cent in the next decade.
At the close of yesterday's meeting, the ministers also thanked Indonesia for rolling out its action plan to deal with the haze problem.
This includes sharing more information on hotspots to the provincial and district levels and organising campaigns on zero burning techniques.
Dr Yaacob said that Singapore was pleased with its cooperation with Indonesia in the fire-prone Jambi province and is now exploring the possibility of working together with other such affected Indonesian provinces in the future.
The next ministerial committee meeting on the haze issue - the 12th since the inaugural get-together in 2006 - is scheduled to take place later this year in Thailand.
Second haze project for Singapore, Jakarta?
Joint effort targeting South Sumatra will try to replicate success seen in Jambi region
Amresh Gunasingham Straits Times 18 Feb 11;
SINGAPORE has offered to collaborate with Indonesia on a second project in the fire-prone Sumatra region, a source of much of the haze that has come this way since the early 1990s.
Talks between government officials, which are at an exploratory stage, have identified the vast South Sumatra province as a possible area for the new collaboration.
This comes more than four years after both sides agreed to work on a $1 million project in neighbouring Jambi province.
Officials hope the second collaboration will replicate the success seen in Jambi, where the number of recorded hot spots from forest fires has dropped by more than 20 per cent in the past few years.
The funds there were invested in initiatives such as programmes to teach farmers how to cultivate crops without resorting to burning, and training local officials to interpret satellite pictures so they can monitor hot spots.
Discussions on the new plans took place at a meeting of Asean environment ministers here yesterday. At a press conference afterwards, Indonesia's Environment Minister Gusti Hatta said he was confident that the country's Parliament would ratify the 2002 Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution by the end of the year.
This comes more than two years after MPs rejected the pact, after pointing out that many foreign-owned plantation companies, not local farmers, were culpable for much of the forest clearing.
Yesterday, Professor Hatta said efforts to get the treaty ratified were also impeded by time constraints and the need to push through a raft of other legislation.
'Our ministry has in the past put the treaty up for ratification (in Parliament) but it has been resisted up to now,' he said, adding: 'At last ratification will be discussed in Parliament this year.'
Speaking to The Straits Times later, Prof Hatta reiterated his intention to give the issue priority.
He also said that work has continued on the ground to clamp down on illegal fire-starters.
'The important thing is, Indonesia is very serious about combating the fires,' he said.
Prof Hatta was here for the 11th meeting of the Sub-Regional Ministerial Steering Committee on Transboundary Haze Pollution, which was also attended by representatives from Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and the Asean Secretariat.
At the press conference, Singapore's Environment and Water Resources Minister Yaacob Ibrahim said the haze could make a return after this June, due to anticipated drier conditions in the region at that time of year.
'This means that we have to continue to be vigilant,' he said.
Dry spells stretching over several weeks encourage farmers to clear the land for the annual plantation season.
Asked why South Sumatra was picked for the second collaboration project, he said that several areas were identified, but it was chosen as it is near to Jambi: 'That part of Sumatra contributes quite significantly to the haze here.'
The amount of resources to be committed is likely to parallel the Jambi project, although it will also depend on the needs on the ground, Dr Yaacob said.
'At the basic level, it will replicate the training, build up capacity (and) air quality monitoring station,' he added.
Three other Asean members - Brunei, Thailand and Malaysia - also expressed interest in projects to combat burning in fire-prone provinces. Malaysia, for example, has an ongoing collaboration with Indonesia in the fire-prone province of Riau.
At yesterday's meeting, the Asean ministers also agreed to build up the capacity of each country's weather and fire monitoring systems, as a way to standardise the way they manage the haze.
Weather patterns will also be studied over the long term to monitor for climate change in the region, said a spokesman for the National Environment Agency.
Indonesia committed to ratify ASEAN Haze Agreement
S Ramesh Channel NewsAsia 17 Feb 11;
SINGAPORE: Indonesia has given its commitment that it will ratify the ASEAN Haze Agreement this year.
Singapore's Minister for the Environment and Water Resources, Dr Yaacob Ibrahim, announced this at the end of the 11th Ministerial Steering Committee on Transboundary Haze Pollution held in Singapore.
Echoing Dr Yaacob's point, the Indonesian State Minister for Environment, Professor Dr Gusti Muhammad Hatta, added that his country is committed to further reduce the number of hotspots by 20 per cent each year.
The ministers have also adopted a strategic review of their committee's programmes and activities.
These include enhancing haze control management - by having a fire danger rating system for early warning purposes - and peatland management.
National Environment Agency's chief executive officer, Andrew Tan, explained that a fire danger rating system gives countries a head-start before a haze period begins by looking at particular regions in the country which are prone to haze.
He explained that Malaysia and Indonesia have been working on this system and they have shown that it can work. The two countries want to improve upon it by collating the data from the rest of the ASEAN countries to make it available ASEAN-wide.
In a joint statement issued at the end of their Singapore meeting, the five countries (Brunei, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Indonesia) also agreed to stay vigilant and be prepared for any occurrence of transboundary haze from fires during the extended periods of dry weather in the coming months.
Dr Yaacob said: "The work at the ground continues and that is very important for us. And looking at the report in terms of hotspots last year and the forecast this year, a lot more needs to be done - we have been able to put in a lot of programme on the ground.
"The collaborations between Malaysia-Indonesia and Riau and Singapore-Indonesia and Jambi have both proven to be successful. There is now a sense that we can replicate this in other provinces and Indonesia is exploring this.
"And we will wait for the signal from Indonesia on how best we can replicate the experiences both in Jambi and Riau into other provinces. We have identified a couple of areas and we have spoken to our Indonesian colleague - one possible area is in south Sumatra."
- CNA/fa/al
