Best of our wild blogs: 24 Dec 17

Thank you, from a living reef
Hantu Blog

Pulau Tekukor
Peiyan.Photography

Singapore got mangroves meh?
wild shores of singapore

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Police rescue 49 passengers stranded on ferry at Changi Ferry Terminal; MPA probing incident

Lydia Lam and Jose Hong Straits Times 23 Dec 17;

SINGAPORE - A total of 49 passengers on board a ferry from Malaysia could not disembark at Changi Ferry Terminal on Thursday night (Dec 21) as a barge belonging to a contractor carrying out jetty upgrading works was blocking the way.

In response to queries from The Straits Times, a spokesman for the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA) said on Friday that the terminal, which is operated by the Johor Port Authority (JPA), is currently undergoing jetty upgrading works.

At about 7.45pm on Thursday, MPA was informed that an incoming ferry with 49 passengers from Tanjung Belungkor, near Desaru, could not berth at the jetty due to a barge that was obstructing its path.

This barge was deployed by JPA's contractor who was overseeing upgrading works, MPA said.

Lianhe Wanbao said in a report on Friday that the passengers were stuck on the ferry for 45 minutes, with some so angered that they called the police.

MPA said that officers from the Singapore Police Force responded to the incident and helped the affected passengers to disembark safely.

A passenger who wanted to be known only as Mrs Chan said that she left Desaru at 6.50pm and was supposed to arrive in Singapore at 7.10pm.

However, when the ferry arrived at Changi Ferry Terminal, the crew did not allow them to disembark, said the 38-year-old who works in the medical industry.

"We went to the roof of the ferry and only then did we realise that a barge was blocking the way," she said.

She said that about 10 passengers had to rush for flights and tried to climb out of the ferry.

All the passengers left the ferry terminal only after 9pm, more than two hours after they were supposed to arrive, according to Mrs Chan.

She said she could not understand how anyone could let the barge block the ferry terminal and prevent other ferries from accessing it. “I just cannot believe it, it’s so ridiculous," she said.

To help respond to any emergency situation that may have arisen while passengers were disembarking, MPA deployed its patrol craft.

After the incident, JPA issued a stop-work order to their contractor, and towed the barge away to prevent obstruction to incoming ferries.

It is unclear if any other ferries were affected. According to Malaysian ferry company Limbongan Maju's website, the last ferry to Singapore from Tanjung Belungkor departs at 6.30pm and arrives in Changi at 7pm.

An employee at the firm told ST that one of its ferries was affected by the barge on Thursday, but the barge has since been towed away.

Ferry services at Changi Ferry Terminal resumed at 8am on Friday as per normal.

JPA general manager Muhammad Razif Ahmad said the ferry was blocked because the contractor - tasked with installing a new pontoon - arrived ahead of schedule.

"It should not happen in the future, we have already coordinated with MPA and the contractor. I don't think it will be repeated," he told ST.

MPA said it was investigating the incident along with JPA, and will also work together to ensure the smooth operation of ferry services during upgrading works at the terminal.

Additional reporting by Shannon Teoh

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Malaysia: Rhino Iman eating more as her health improves

OLIVIA MIWIL New Straits Times 23 Dec 17;

KOTA KINABALU: The cancer-stricken Sumatran rhinoceros is showing improvement, said Sabah Wildlife Department director Augustine Tuuga.

Iman, the country's last female rhino, has been eating more food and managed to defecate and urinate as compared to last week when she was diagnosed with uterine cancer.

Before this, the pain caused by the cancer had affected Iman's appetite and hydration status.

"Apart from her bloody vaginal discharge she is eating more each day although it is still inadequate.

"She consumed 1.5 kilogramme of mixed browse in the morning and another 1.5 kg in the afternoon," Augustine said in a statement, adding there would be more feeding when Iman wakes up at 8pm and 10pm.

Sabah Wildlife Department director Augustine Tuuga says Iman has been eating more. Pic courtesy Sabah Wildlife Department.
Iman, who is being cared at Tabin Wildlife Reserve in Lahad Datu, has her body covered with mud to keep her for cool and prevent insect bites.

Augustine added she was also being given intravenous fluids and antibiotics.

Iman was the last wild rhino found in Malaysia. She was captured in the Danum Valley and transported to the wildlife reserve in March 2014.

Despite being diagnosed with severe fibroids, she still produced eggs for previous in-vitro fertilisation attempts.

The country lost another female rhino, Puntung, about six months ago.

Puntung was euthanised on June 4 after suffering from skin cancer.

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Indonesia: Jakarta Is Sinking So Fast, It Could End Up Underwater

A tsunami of human-made troubles in the Indonesian capital poses an imminent threat to the city’s survival. And it has to deal with mounting threats from climate change.
MICHAEL KIMMELMAN, Photographs by JOSH HANER New York Times 21 Dec 17;

JAKARTA — Rasdiono remembers when the sea was a good distance from his doorstep, down a hill. Back then he opened the cramped, gaily painted bayside shack he named the Blessed Bodega, where he and his family sell catfish heads, spiced eggs and fried chicken.

It was strange, Rasdiono said. Year by year, the water crept closer. The hill gradually disappeared. Now the sea loomed high over the shop, just steps away, held back only by a leaky wall.

With climate change, the Java Sea is rising and weather here is becoming more extreme. Earlier this month another freakish storm briefly turned Jakarta’s streets into rivers and brought this vast area of nearly 30 million residents to a virtual halt.

One local climate researcher, Irvan Pulungan, an adviser to the city’s governor, fears that temperatures may rise several degrees Fahrenheit, and the sea level as much as three feet in the region, over the coming century.

That, alone, spells potential disaster for this teeming metropolis.

But global warming turned out not to be the only culprit behind the historic floods that overran Rasdiono’s bodega and much of the rest of Jakarta in 2007. The problem, it turned out, was that the city itself is sinking.

In fact, Jakarta is sinking faster than any other big city on the planet, faster, even, than climate change is causing the sea to rise — so surreally fast that rivers sometimes flow upstream, ordinary rains regularly swamp neighborhoods and buildings slowly disappear underground, swallowed by the earth. The main cause: Jakartans are digging illegal wells, drip by drip draining the underground aquifers on which the city rests — like deflating a giant cushion underneath it. About 40 percent of Jakarta now lies below sea level.

Coastal districts, like Muara Baru, near the Blessed Bodega, have sunk as much as 14 feet in recent years. Not long ago I drove around northern Jakarta and saw teenagers fishing in the abandoned shell of a half-submerged factory. The banks of a murky canal lapped at the trestle of a railway bridge, which, until recently, had arched high over it.

Climate change acts here as it does elsewhere, exacerbating scores of other ills. And in Jakarta’s case, a tsunami of human-made troubles — runaway development, a near-total lack of planning, next to no sewers and only a limited network of reliable, piped-in drinking water — poses an imminent threat to the city’s survival.

Sinking buildings, sprawl, polluted air and some of the worst traffic jams in the world are symptoms of other deeply rooted troubles. Distrust of government is a national condition. Conflicts between Islamic extremists and secular Indonesians, Muslims and ethnic Chinese have blocked progress, helped bring down reform-minded leaders and complicated everything that happens here, or doesn’t happen, to stop the city from sinking.

“Nobody here believes in the greater good, because there is so much corruption, so much posturing about serving the public when what gets done only serves private interests,” as Sidney Jones, the director of the local Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict, put it. “There is no trust.”

Hydrologists say the city has only a decade to halt its sinking. If it can’t, northern Jakarta, with its millions of residents, will end up underwater, along with much of the nation’s economy. Eventually, barring wholesale change and an infrastructural revolution, Jakarta won’t be able to build walls high enough to hold back the rivers, canals and the rising Java Sea.

And even then, of course, if it does manage to heal its self-inflicted wounds, it still has to cope with all the mounting threats from climate change.

As far the eye can see, 21st-century Jakarta is a smoggy tangle of freeways and skyscrapers. Spread along the northwestern coast of Java, this capital of the nation with the world’s largest Muslim population used to be a soggy, bug-infested trading port for the Hindu kingdom of Sunda before local sultans took it over in 1527.

They named it Jayakarta, Javanese for victorious city.

Dutch colonists arrived a century later, establishing a base for the East India territories. Imagining a tropical Amsterdam, they laid out streets and canals to try to cope with water pouring in from the south, out of the forests and mountains, where rain falls nearly 300 days out of the year. Thirteen rivers feed into the city.

After independence in 1945, the city began to sprawl. Today, it is virtually impossible to walk around. Parks are rarer than Javan rhinos. A trip to the nearest botanical garden requires the better part of a day in bumper-to-bumper traffic.

“Living here, we don’t have other places to go,” said Yudi and Titi, a young professional couple who one recent Sunday had made the roughly hour’s round trip from western Jakarta to the center of the city just to spend a few minutes walking up and down a chaotic, multilane freeway briefly closed to traffic. “Without cars, at least you can breathe for a few minutes,” Titi said.

The most urgent problems are in North Jakarta, a coastal mash-up of ports, nautically themed high-rises, aged fish markets, abject slums, power plants, giant air-conditioned malls and the congested remnants of the colonial Dutch settlement, with its decrepit squares and streets of crumbling warehouses and dusty museums.

Some of the world’s most polluted canals and rivers weave a spider’s web through the area.

It is where the city is sinking fastest.

That’s because, after decades of reckless growth and negligent leadership, crises have lined up here like dominoes.

Jakartan developers and others illegally dig untold numbers of wells because water is piped to less than half the population at what published reports say are extortionate costs by private companies awarded government concessions.

The aquifers aren’t being replenished, despite heavy rains and the abundance of rivers, because more than 97 percent of Jakarta is now smothered by concrete and asphalt. Open fields that once absorbed rain have been paved over. Shores of mangroves that used to help relieve swollen rivers and canals during monsoons have been overtaken by shantytowns and apartment towers.

There is always tension between immediate needs and long-term plans. It’s a similar story in other sinking giants like Mexico City. Here, all of the construction, combined with the draining of the aquifers, is causing the rock and sediment on which Jakarta rests to pancake.

Construction has skyrocketed as businesses and foreigners have arrived, and also because rural Indonesians have been fleeing the lowlands of Sumatra and Kalimantan, the Indonesian part of Borneo. They have been driven out by coal mines and tobacco farms. The effect on the countryside has been disastrous, with the burning of rain forests to make way for palm oil producers and textile factories causing fires so smoky they have caused air pollution to spike as far away as Malaysia, contributing to climate change.

These factories also dump tons of waste and chemicals into waterways, contaminating the city’s drinking water supply.

And many of the rural poor have settled in Jakarta in informal developments, or kampungs, that cluster along canals, their houses teetering above the water on stilts, the waterways underneath becoming default sewers.

All of these homes, all of this sewage and garbage now jam pumping stations that the city has had to build because gravity no longer drains the rivers and canals naturally.

To halt the sinking, the city needs to stop the digging of wells, which means Jakarta must provide residents with reliable, clean, piped-in water and, to clear the waterways, somehow — at a cost of untold billions — retrofit one of the world’s biggest cities with a sewer system, or something approaching it.

Cleaning the canals and rivers will also require policing the factories that dump chemicals, which means grappling with corruption — and resettling many of the informal communities. But resettlement depends on finding land and then building thousands of new homes for displaced residents, most of whom don’t want to move in the first place.

A Difficult Solution: Evictions

One afternoon I met a man named Topaz in the ruins of an evicted waterfront kampung named Akuarium. A soft-spoken 31-year-old events organizer, Topaz described himself as a third-generation resident of what used to be a thriving informal neighborhood with four-story buildings and bustling streets filled with shops.

That was before the bulldozers arrived. The Akuarium I found had been reduced to mounds of broken masonry and concrete.

“The government said the eviction was about cleaning the river, but I believe it was about politics and development,” Topaz told me, reflecting a belief widely held among residents. He showed me around the tattered, windswept tent he shares with a dozen other squatters not far from where his family home used to be. Over his shoulder, several luxury waterfront apartment towers were under construction. “I saw promotions for those towers that showed Akuarium turned into a park,” Topaz said.

Jakarta’s former governor, Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, known as Ahok, ordered the eviction. He is ethnic Chinese, a geological engineer by training. As governor, he tackled several of Jakarta’s big problems, or tried to. He tried, but failed, to wrest control of the water supply from the private companies. He assembled a sanitation crew, called the Orange Army, to remove sediment and garbage from rivers and canals.

And he cleared out some of the kampungs that obstructed waterways. The efforts began to make a difference. Rains that once caused days of floods drained within hours.

But many people forced out, like Topaz, resisted the moves, convinced that the evictions were really intended to enrich developers, not improve drainage. Akuarium became a hotbed of protest against the governor.

Capitalizing on residents’ resistance and the piety of the urban poor, the hard-line Islamic Defenders Front teamed with some of the governor’s political rivals and religious conservatives to tap into a vein of anti-Chinese populism. Ahok’s enemies escalated what had been a conflict over the displacement of a fishing community into an argument about whether a non-Muslim should lead a Muslim-majority city.

The governor found himself regularly attacked at Friday prayers. He lost his re-election bid, and the Islamists, who exploited anger against him, had him brought up on charges of blasphemy. He is serving two years in prison.

The new governor of Jakarta, Anies Baswedan, who ran a campaign that drew support from Akuarium’s angry residents, announced in November as one of his first acts that he planned to rebuild some of the shelters at the kampung.

At another evicted settlement called Bukit Duri, I met Agus Fadilah, 34, a motorbike-taxi driver, gazing at the rubble of what used to be his house on the banks of the Ciliwung, one of the city’s main rivers. Bulldozers were still moving piles of debris, and a few women were scavenging for family belongings.

Upstream, several other kampungs had already been cleared, the river widened, its banks lined with concrete and surrounded by high concrete walls, now tagged with graffiti. The river there looks imprisoned, but water flows more easily.

“I was raised here, my job was here,” Mr. Agus said, noting that he, his wife and two young children had been relocated to a new apartment building hours away. They make long daily commutes because they want to keep the children in their old schools.

“I know why they did this,” he told me. “It had to do with the river. I know this was not legally our land. But it was my home.”

Residents of Bukit Duri filed a class-action lawsuit against the government to protest the evictions. Recently, a district court judge ruled in their favor.

“It’s not that nobody should move,” argues Elisa Sutanudjaja, a kampung advocate and the executive director at the Rujak Center for Urban Studies. “These poor communities don’t all want to stay in place, but they do want to stay together and near their jobs, and they want legal status.

“Mostly, they want to be consulted,” she said.

They also want to show, where possible, that moving isn’t the only solution. In a leafy kampung called Tongkol, residents during the last couple of years have installed their own septic tanks and kept their stretch of the Ciliwung clean. A young architect named Kamil Muhammad, from Architecture Sans Frontieres-Indonesia, designed a low-cost home made of concrete, bamboo and reused brick. It stacks seven tiny apartments under a covered communal roof deck.

The project is a template for cheap, do-it-yourself housing that can free up space along Jakarta’s waterways critical for flood control.

“We want to demonstrate to the government that kampungs can actually be beneficial to the river,” Kamil told me as we looked over the river from the roof deck. Below, banana and star fruit trees shaded a riverside promenade of colorful facades and vegetable gardens.

JanJaap Brinkman, a hydrologist who for decades has been studying Jakarta for the Dutch water research institute Deltares, sympathizes with residents of communities like Akuarium and Tongkol. Eviction isn’t a cure-all, or even possible, he said, considering how many countless thousands of Jakartans now live atop the canals and rivers in informal developments. At the same time, Mr. Brinkman stressed, moving people is necessary, and bungled evictions squander a meager reservoir of good will and precious time.

“We need big steps now,” he said. “If all the discussions get tied up with fishermen and development, there will eventually be a massive calamity and deaths and no choice but to give up on whole parts of Jakarta.”


There is occasional talk here about the Indonesian government moving its capital elsewhere, to shrink the city. Politicians issue decrees prohibiting developers from digging wells and imploring residents to store rainwater. Enforcement is negligible.

Mr. Brinkman drove me one morning to the city’s new 16-mile Eastern Flood Channel, its banks lined with parkland. The channel has helped relieve flooding. From there we toured a century-old water gate, also recently repaired. “A few years ago this was solid waste,” Mr. Brinkman said, gesturing across the wide, murky water. On the opposite bank, sanitation crews in bright orange outfits gathered around garbage trucks. They belonged to Ahok’s Orange Army.

“This gate is nothing like it used to be,” Mr. Brinkman said. “You used to be able to walk across the water, it was so clogged with garbage and sediment.”

As he spoke, one of the orange-clad sanitation workers leaned his head back, polished off a bottle of water and tossed the empty plastic container over one shoulder into the river.

Real progress is often thwarted here. The most ambitious move by the city is the construction of what’s called the Coastal Wall, now rising like a black cliff from Jakarta Bay. It’s a quasi-temporary barrier to hold back the rising sea and compensate for subsidence — built extra high because, like the rest of North Jakarta, it is expected to sink, too. With subsidence at the current rate, the Coastal Wall itself may be underwater by 2030.

Even more alarming, Mr. Brinkman showed me one spot along the waterfront where the wall ends and all that holds back the sea is a low, crumbling concrete rampart. The water was only a couple of feet below the top when we peered over the embankment.

“If this wall breaks, there’s simply no holding back the Java Sea,” said Mr. Brinkman, gesturing from the rampart toward the city. “Jakarta will flood all the way to the center of town, six kilometers from here. I could take you to 20 other places just like this.”

The Coastal Wall belongs to a larger project that Indonesian officials undertook three years ago in collaboration with the Dutch government. Called the National Capital Integrated Coastal Development program, it imagines supplementing the Coastal Wall with a second barrier, a Giant Sea Wall, or massive dike, miles out to sea, in effect closing off Jakarta Bay entirely.

The dike would not just block rising waters. According to the original plan, it would also become the spine for an immense new megadistrict and ring road, a $40 billion development — and a windfall for real estate moguls and Dutch consultants — designed in the shape of a garuda, the national bird.

The Great Garuda, as it came to be called, was Jakarta’s Big Idea.

Or it was until just lately.

The government has now backtracked on the megadistrict idea, while still envisioning the dike itself — the very notion of which has provoked understandable skepticism. As environmentalists have pointed out, if the city doesn’t first clean up its rivers and canals, a dike will turn an enclosed Jakarta Bay into the world’s largest cesspool.

The development scheme was also linked to discredited plans for reclaimed islands inside the bay. Delayed for years by recession and legal wrangling, the islands started to get built in 2013, marketed as posh oases of condominiums, yacht marinas and golf courses primarily to customers in places like Malaysia and Singapore.

Enraged fishermen sued, claiming that the islands destroyed their traditional fishing grounds. When one developer was exposed for bribing local officials, a scandal erupted and construction was halted.

At the same time, the islands had become tied up with the Great Garuda. Officials, including Ahok, realized that a tax on the islands’ developers could help Indonesia pay for the giant dike, along with other costly initiatives to clear waterways and stop the sinking.

In essence, a plan that environmentalists and many poor fishermen agreed would wreak environmental havoc on the bay and North Jakarta was being touted by Jakartan leadership as a means to save the city itself — and from climate change.

Ardhasena Sopalheluwakan is among the climate scientists here who think the best approach was never to construct a giant dike but “to give back part of North Jakarta to nature,” as he put it to me one recent morning. The idea would be to “reintroduce mangroves and rejuvenate some of the dozens of reservoirs that were actually part of old Jakarta.”

From Mr. Brinkman’s perspective, just “counteracting subsidence will account for 90 percent of what this city needs to do to deal with climate change.”

Tokyo was in a similar predicament after World War II, he likes to point out. It had sunk about 12 feet since 1900. But the city poured resources into new infrastructure and established stricter rules about development, and within a decade or two made itself a global model of urban innovation, better able to cope with the effects of climate change.

“Jakarta could become a 21st-century version of Tokyo in the 20th century, an example for urban redevelopment,” Irvan Pulungan, the climate change adviser to the city’s new governor, imagined.

But “a city that can’t deliver basic services is a failed city,” he added. ”On top of conventional issues like flooding and urbanization we now have climate change, tipping the scale. And at this rate, people will be fighting in the streets for increasingly limited resources like clean water and safe living spaces.”

Like Tokyo half a century ago, Jakarta is at a turning point, he said: “Nature will no longer wait.”

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UN poised to move ahead with landmark treaty to protect high seas

Waters outside national boundaries are currently unregulated, devastated by overfishing and pollution. 140 countries back the motion to establish a treaty
Jonathan Watts The Guardian 22 Aug 17;

The world’s oceans are set for a long overdue boost in the coming days as the United Nations votes for the first time on a planned treaty to protect and regulate the high seas.

The waters outside national maritime boundaries – which cover half of the planet’s surface – are currently a free-for-all that has led to devastating overfishing and pollution.

But after more than five years of negotiations, UN members are poised to agree to draw up a new rulebook by 2020, which could establish conservation areas, catch quotas and scientific monitoring.

“This is the biggest opportunity to change the status quo we have ever had,” said Will McCallum, the head of oceans at Greenpeace. “It could change everything.”

A debate on whether to move ahead with a High Seas Treaty has been tabled before the end of the year at the UN headquarters in New York.

The motion is supported by 140 nations, which is more than the two-thirds needed for passage.

“This is great news. This vote could open the way to create a Paris Agreement for the ocean,” said Maria Damanaki, a former European Union Commissioner for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries who is now working for The Nature Conservancy. “This could be the most important step I have seen in my 30 years working on oceans.”

Only 3.5% of the world’s oceans are currently protected. The remainder is increasingly over-exploited and contaminated by pollution, fishing and seabed mining. “There are multiple stressors and they are all getting worse,” said Damaki. Despite the grim situation, she was optimistic that attitudes were changing thanks to programmes such as the BBC’s Blue Planet and media campaigns about plastics dumped in the ocean.

Conservation groups have lined up to support a treaty. “The science is clear on the role oceans play in ensuring the current and future liveability of the planet. If we want our oceans to continue to provide food, absorb carbon, and regulate climate for the planet, protecting the biodiversity of the high seas is critical,” said Aulani Wilhelm, SVP, Center for Oceans at Conservation International.

If the vote passes as expected, the UN will host four meetings over the next two years to draft the treaty. Ocean activists hope this will lift the subject to the same level as climate and land biodiversity and ultimately result in a legally binding set of regulations.

But the scale and scope of a treaty is not yet decided. There are also doubts about how effective it will be given the difficulties of enforcement, which will rely on national governments.

“Enforcement will be a key issue facing nations over the next two years,” said Liz Karan, of the Pew Charitable Trust. “We’re not expecting a UN navy, but we hope that big nations will use their navies plus advances in satellite technology and tighter monitoring requirements for all vessels to have tracking devices.”

Several major fishing nations have been hesitant about signing up. Iceland, Japan and South Korea have moved towards support for a treaty, though some of their negotiators want it to exclude fishing. “The US and Russia haven’t signed, but they haven’t opposed either,” Damanaki said. There are also hopes that China will come round and play a positive leadership role as it is increasingly doing on climate issues.

Despite such uncertainties, conservation groups say the heightened focus on oceans is a sign of progress.

“Some of the most undersurveyed of all ocean systems are in the high seas, and because they aren’t protected by the laws of any country, they are among the most vulnerable and potentially over-exploited on Earth,” said Aulani Wilhelm of the Center for Oceans at Conservation International. “The science is clear on the role oceans play in ensuring the current and future livability of the planet. If we want our oceans to continue to provide food, absorb carbon, and regulate climate for the planet, protecting the biodiversity of the high seas is critical.”

The Marine Conservation Institute concurred that the move towards a treaty was a hugely positive development. “A growing body of science also points to the significant role of oceans in sequestering carbon,” the group noted, “so healthier, more abundant oceans will also help address climate change.”

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Best of our wild blogs: 23 Dec 17

Rare tree at Chek Jawa coastal hill discovered: a new record for Pulau Ubin
Flying Fish Friends

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Singapore begins first detailed archaeological surveys on Pulau Ubin

Justin Ong Channel NewsAsia 22 Dec 17;

SINGAPORE: The National Parks Board (NParks) and ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute (ISEAS) on Friday (Dec 22) announced the start of the first phase of in-depth archaeological surveys on Pulau Ubin.

The surveys started a week ago and are being conducted at two World War Two gun emplacements of Ubin’s Anti-Motor Torpedo Boat (AMTB) battery, which were built north of the island between 1936 and 1939 to defend the Johor Straits.

The gun emplacements now reside at a National Police Cadet Corps (NPCC) campsite.

Surveys will take place in three phases over 18 months, said ISEAS associate fellow and archaeologist Lim Chen Sian during a media visit which was attended by Second Minister for National Development and Minister for Social and Family Development Desmond Lee.

“Previously there were only pedestrian surveys involving mainly visual inspection, as early as 1949,” Mr Lim added. “Now we have the resources ... to figure out what really happened here.

“At this stage it’s really about documenting, mapping out, creating an inventory and blueprint.”

Depending on results of the first phase, more surveys may be carried out at the gun emplacements or at other sites on the western side of Ubin.

The detailed study of the archaeological and historical remains at these sites will involve fieldwork such as identifying, mapping and recording heritage features - along with basic sampling such as surface collections.

Sub-surface probes may also be carried out to analyse areas with a high probability of buried remains.

The surveys will complement and add to ongoing cultural heritage and biodiversity research on the island, and serve as a guide for NParks to strategise conservation efforts, according to the agency’s Ubin director Robert Teo.

“We will explore the possibility of future public access,” he said. “The idea is to preserve (historical sites like these) for future generations to enjoy.”

Source: CNA/kk


First in-depth archaeological study on Pulau Ubin begins
TOH EE MING Today Online 22 Dec 17;

SINGAPORE — Researchers are on their latest quest to uncover another slice of Singapore’s history, with the start of an inaugural series of in-depth archaeological surveys on Pulau Ubin. They will begin by examining World War Two artefacts.

Led by the National Parks Board (NParks) and Iseas-Yusof Ishak Institute, the first of the surveys kicked off on Friday (Dec 22) at the National Police Cadet Corps Campsite on the 10.2 sq km island.

The former site of the World War Two gun emplacement of the Ubin Anti-Motor Torpedo Boat battery, it is a rare surviving example of war relics found in Singapore.

Estimated to have been constructed between 1936 and 1939, the guns were positioned on Pulau Ubin to defend the Johor Straits from enemy ships and were part of a fortification along Singapore’s northeastern coast, running from Changi to Pulau Tekong.

The 18-month study, which will be split into three phrases, will document the archaeological and historical remains at selected sites on the island.

As part of the Ubin Project — which seeks ideas from the public on how to preserve the island’s rustic charm — the study will complement ongoing cultural heritage and biodiversity research on Pulau Ubin.

The findings will add to existing information about the island’s cultural heritage. Much of its history is still unknown despite the presence of a number of abandoned historical sites dating back to the 1800s.

Under the first phase of the study, fieldwork by the 12-member team will include surveys that identify, map, and record heritage features with basic sampling of surface collections. Subsurface probes may be used to analyse areas where there is a high probability of buried archaeological remains.

Iseas associate fellow Lim Chen Sian said the findings will be pivotal in shedding light on Singapore’s trade, economic and military history, and contribute to archaeological and historic research.

For instance, part of the study will investigate whether the former gun emplacement site was used during the Battle of Singapore or by the Japanese, what happened to it post-war, whether there was evidence of the guns mounted, or the presence of soldiers, he said.

Previously, there were only pedestrian surveys involving mainly visual inspection, from as early as 1949, Mr Lim added. “It’s about creating an inventory at this stage, mapping it out, measuring everything, and making a blueprint.”

Depending on the findings of the first phrase, subsequent archaeological surveys may be conducted at the same areas or at the western part of the island.

Other areas of research include looking at aspects of social history, such as the roles supporting the military – the water coolies, washer women, or people who polished the soldiers’ boots, for instance.

“We know big events happened, but there are little things that tell a story as well... Archaeology doesn’t just give you the big macro picture, but (studying the activities of the soldiers) also evoke some kind of emotion (about what they went through),” said Mr Lim.

The former gun emplacement site is in a restricted area, and NParks’ director for Pulau Ubin Robert Teo said the authorities will explore making it accessible to the public.

“There’s been a lot of work done on the cultural and natural heritage of Pulau Ubin, such as the biodiversity of wildlife,” said Mr Teo. “This survey will give another layer of information to help us for future management, so this can be preserved and conserved for future generations to enjoy as well.”

There are nine of such gun emplacement sites in Singapore, such as at Changi Outer and Changi Inner (the present Changi Ferry terminal), two at Palau Tekong and one at Sentosa.

NParks is funding the study with S$38,000 in cash, while Iseas-Yusof Ishak Institute is contributing S$107,000 worth of manpower, equipment and expertise.


In-depth survey may unearth Ubin's mystery
Archaeological study will explore why there is no evidence of guns at rare WWII battery
Rachel Au-Yong Straits Times 23 Dec 17;

On the northern shores of Pulau Ubin sit two emplacements, meant to hold guns capable of shooting 70 rounds a minute.

The battery, estimated to have been built between 1936 and 1939, was positioned to defend the Strait of Johor from enemy ships.

It was part of an entire fortification system along Singapore's north-eastern coast, from Changi to Pulau Tekong.


There were nine such emplacements in total, but the two on Ubin are rare examples of World War II relics here that have been preserved intact.

However, there is no evidence that actual guns were ever mounted on the emplacements.

Now, researchers want to know why. They hope for answers as they embark on an archaeological survey that will have three phases over 18 months to shed light on Singapore's trade, and economic and military history.

"One school of thought is that (the British) ran out of money," said ISEAS - Yusof Ishak Institute associate fellow Lim Chen Sian yesterday, in officially launching the survey.

"If guns were mounted here, they would have had gunners manning the fort, and there would be a lot of debris - soldiers would be drinking beer, smoking cigarettes, eating and throwing trash. If we can find that, the entire assemblage of artefacts would suggest this place has been used.

"So far, we haven't come across anything like that," he said, adding that he would like to find out what happened to the post during and after World War II.

The National Parks Board (NParks), an agency under the Ministry of National Development, is contributing $38,000 to the research, while ISEAS - Yusof Ishak Institute is giving $107,000 in kind.

For the first phase of the study, the team of six researchers, who live on the island, will document and study the battery in detail.

They will also carry out basic sampling, and may use sub-surface probes in areas where there is a high likelihood of buried remains.

This is the first in-depth survey of the 1,020ha island - about 10 times the size of Sengkang town and a 15-minute boat ride from the mainland.

It is famous for its rich biodiversity, but not much is known about its history.

The sites of the gun emplacements at the National Police Cadet Corps campsite in Pulau Ubin. One of the sites is located in the jungle (above), while the other has been fitted with a replica of a gun (left). In reality, no evidence has been found to
The sites of the gun emplacements at the National Police Cadet Corps campsite in Pulau Ubin. One of the sites has been fitted with a replica of a gun (above). PHOTO: LIANHE ZAOBAO
As for the next two phases of the study, Dr Lim said it was still early days yet. But he hopes to look into the cultural heritage of Pulau Ubin, already known for its rich biodiversity.

"It would be interesting to study the other people serving the military - who were the ones providing food, who were the ones polishing their boots," he said.

He added that the survey would be of great historical value.

"The United Kingdom's greatest defeat was in Singapore - they lost a lot of people, a whole squadron of ships, so this in itself is historical on an international level."

At the same time, he hoped that the findings will eventually tell a story about life on the island.

"Archaeology can not only give you the big picture but also go down to the little things, like what soldiers eat," he said.

Yesterday, Second Minister for National Development Desmond Lee visited the site, which is located in the National Police Cadet Corps' Camp Resilience campsite.

It is currently closed to the public, but an NParks spokesman said it could be made open to the public in the future.

Mr Lee later said on Facebook that the survey is part of the Government's efforts to conserve the island's cultural heritage and biodiversity through The Ubin Project, which was started in 2014, and will "guide NParks in the management strategies for Pulau Ubin".

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Powering Singapore's growth through green finance

Simon Tay and Yeo Lian Sim Straits Times 23 Dec 17;

President Donald Trump has withdrawn the United States from the Paris Agreement for fear that it gives the world's top polluting countries an edge over his country. Others, like the European Union and China, however, remain committed to combating climate change and are taking the lead. Singapore is joining those who will move ahead.

At the UN Climate Change Conference last month in Germany, Singapore Minister for the Environment and Water Resources Masagos Zulkifli announced that Singapore will designate 2018 as the Year of Climate Action. This underscores a raft of measures implemented over the past two years.

One key step will be a carbon tax imposed from 2019 on large direct emitters of greenhouse gases. The exact amount of tax is not announced but it is expected to steer companies towards greater energy efficiency and lower carbon emissions. This follows moves by the Singapore Exchange (SGX) to require all listed companies to report according to its sustainability reporting guidelines on a "comply or explain" basis.

A United Nations-backed network of investors has also released new voluntary climate-related indicators that are aligned with the recommendations of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD). The task force was set up by the G-20's Financial Stability Board to provide guidelines that will help in the assessment and pricing of climate-related risk and opportunities.

Climate change has become an issue for both environmentalists and businesses.

Financial institutions here are doing their bit. Besides the guidelines on responsible financing introduced by the Association of Banks in Singapore in 2015, Second Minister for Finance Lawrence Wong also announced last month that the government will push for deeper environmental, social and governance (ESG) integration within financial institutions.

ESG is a term used by investors and capital markets to evaluate corporate behaviour and to determine the future financial performance of companies based on their performance in areas such as environmental sustainability.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore is also including sustainability as an aspect of its supervision of banks.

Collectively, these are strong signals of the shift towards sustainable development. Even as some companies are concerned with the additional costs, time and paperwork associated with sustainable reporting, business opportunities also abound.

Take green finance, for example. The idea of green finance - channelling capital to sustainable industries, companies and projects - is already gaining significant momentum in the West and among major Asian economies.

China emphasised green finance in its 13th five-year plan (2016-2020) as playing an important role in the country's new model of development and growth.

During the recent 19th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party, Chinese President Xi Jinping stressed that the country must seek a model of sustainable development characterised by higher production, better living standards and healthy ecosystems. Already, five provinces have been identified as pilot zones to promote green finance.

Japan is also making headlines with its move towards greener investments. Its Government Pension Investment Fund - one of the world's largest and most influential pension funds - announced in July that it would raise its allocation of environmentally and socially responsible investments from 3 to 10 per cent.

Closer to home, Asean presents various opportunities. A study by DBS and the UN Environment Inquiry highlighted that US$3 trillion (S$4 trillion) in green investment is needed between 2016 and 2030 across infrastructure, renewable energy, energy efficiency and food, agriculture and land use.

Green finance offers a means to ensure that these projects are not only economically viable in the long term, but also remain well integrated and accepted among the local communities.

Currently, Singapore lacks a strong and established green finance market. Some remain suspicious about "green washing", when companies or investment funds only appear to be environmentally beneficial.

Instruments that provide information regarding the long-term environmental impacts of green projects are still underdeveloped or in their infancy.

Other players across banks, insurance companies and institutional investors have recognised the untapped opportunities and ventured into green finance, resulting in multiple shades of green.

Local banks today are more explicit in integrating minimum ESG standards in their financing processes. Forums on sustainable investments have emerged, including those led by asset management firms seeking to generate interest and demand. Most insurers, however, still have some way to go.

Such diversity is to be expected at this early stage. There are differing levels of will and capacity, as financial institutions react to different factors. Overly rigid definitions and rules that limit adoption and innovation should be avoided. Instead, having a "band of green" definition can be positive for more institutions to explore green finance's potential and develop leading-edge green products and services.

NEXT STEPS FOR SINGAPORE

To combat climate change and develop Singapore as a green finance hub, a collaborative effort among governments, financial institutions and businesses is essential. Key initial steps are needed to jump-start a green finance market and investments.

First, defining the value of green is critical. Such information is important so that financial institutions and corporations start to recognise the value of green and measure its impact on business and investment. This should be aligned with global standards and practices. Wilmar International, for example, became the first palm oil company to link the interest rate of its bank loan to its sustainability performance.

Greater clarity over what is green will start to emerge as larger companies and small and medium-sized enterprises start to disclose their ESG performance.

The availability of material data supports and adds to the value of green. It also addresses the problem of green washing by making sure that investors are more discerning about the quality of projects or financial instruments they are investing.

Moreover, institutional investors, especially large, influential or government-linked investors must be incentivised to increase their portfolio of green investments or establish "green pockets".

Having a green mandate creates strong demand for green opportunities, creating a ripple effect throughout the value chain in terms of new product creation, as well as skills development.

The world seeks a shift towards sustainability in response to concerns over climate change, and so must Singapore, more so now than ever before. This is not only for the country's future, but also to support the growing needs of the South-east Asia region that it serves.

As one of the world's financial hubs, Singapore can and should make green finance its next step.

Simon Tay is chairman of the Singapore Institute of International Affairs and Yeo Lian Sim is special adviser on diversity at the SGX and vice-chairman of the TCFD. Both authors are also co-chairmen of the Collaborative Initiative for Green Finance in Singapore, which led to the launch of the report "Singapore as a Green Finance Hub for Asean and Asia" at the G-20 Green Finance Conference in Singapore.

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Indonesia: Nine die as bad weather hits South Sulawesi

Andi Hajramurni The Jakarta Post 23 Dec 17;

Bad weather has hit Makassar and other cities across South Sulawesi in the past week. Nine people have reportedly died as heavy rains swept through the area in the last two days.

Makassar resident Muhammad Fadli, 7, died of electric shock during flooding on Thursday. Nur Anna, 46, died after a concrete fence at a warehouse, the foundations of which were swept away during heavy rain, collapsed on her. Daeng Leo, a resident of the Indonesian Doctors Association (IDI) housing complex in Tello Baru, died after he fell and was dragged away by flooding in front of his house on Thursday. His body was found on Friday.

The remaining six people are Jeneponto residents. They died when a vehicle they were traveling in skidded on a wet road in Takalar and crashed into a swamp early on Friday.

It was suspected the driver of the vehicle, which was carrying seven people, drove at a high speed and lost control as it passed along a road that was slippery because of the rain. Three people died at the scene while three others died on their way to the hospital. Another passenger survived the incident and is being treated at a hospital in Jeneponto.

Following the high-intensity rain, floods inundated several areas across Makassar from Thursday to Friday. Around 3,000 residents have been evacuated as floodwater with a depth of between 60 centimeters to more than 2 meters inundated their houses. (ebf)

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Indonesia: Environment Ministry Wins Lawsuit against Corporation Causing Forest Fire

NetralNews 22 Dec 17;

JAKARTA, NNC - The Ministry of Environment and Forestry (KLHK) again showed its firmness to the corporation causing forest and land fire (Karhutla) by winning a civil suit against PT Ricky Kurniawan Kertapersada (PT RKK) in Jambi.

"This is the form of commitment and consistency of Environment Minister Siti Nurbaya against the perpetrators of environmental and forestry crimes, including those done by the corporation," said Director General of Law Enforcement at Environment Ministry Rasio Ridho Sani in Jakarta, Friday (12/22/2017).

He said through the civil suit filed at the Jambi District Court on December 14, 2016, the Environment Minister sued PT RKK for the forest and land fire incident caused by the company's activities.

The lawsuit was initially rejected by the Jambi District Court on June 12, 2017, but the Environment Minister submitted an appeal to the High Court (PT) of Jambi.

Until finally on December 21, 2017, the court declared PT RKK guilty and had to pay material compensation and the cost of ecological restoration amounting to IDR191,804,261,700.

Rasio Ridho Sani who is familiarly called Roy said that law enforcement for corporations involved in forest and land fires, by administrative, criminal, and civil means is a real commitment of the government to indict the perpetrators of environmental and forest crimes.

He hoped the decision of PT Jambi can provide a deterrent effect for the perpetrators of destruction of the environment and forest areas, especially forest and land burners. He is also optimistic that all parties can work together to preserve nature, and realize a smoke-free Indonesia.

For information, PT RKK is an oil palm plantation operating in Puding Village, Kumpeh Sub-district, Muaro Jambi Regency, Jambi Province. The company is known to have burned land in PT RKK plantation area amounting to 591 hectares (ha) in 2015.

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Vietnam: Rare doucs in Son Tra need preserving

VietNamNet Bridge 22 Dec 17;

Scientists have called on re-programming the development of the Son Tra peninsula to protect doucs, a rare primate.

Green Viet, a biodiversity conservation center, said there are more than 1,300 doucs in Son Tra. However, Tran Viet Phuong, head of the Da Nang Forest Rangers’ Unit, said the figure is ‘unconvincing’.

“The previous research found that there were 300-700 doucs, while Green Viet’s survey found 1,300. The number of doucs cannot increase so rapidly,” Phuong said.

He said the Da Nang Forest Rangers’ Unit would make a proposal to carry out further research on biodiversity in Son Tra peninsula, under which scientists would survey the number of red shanked doucs and their characteristics and habits.

Replying to doubts about the number of doucs in Son Tra, Tran Huu Vy, director of Green Viet, said there was no basis to say if the number of doucs in Son Tra had decreased or increased.

He said the surveys in the past were carried out in just some areas of the peninsula and they each had different figures.

Vy affirmed that Green Viet’s figure is more reliable as its scientists surveyed nearly all areas in Son Tra.

According to Vy, the survey method applied by Green Viet is an advanced, accurate method applied by many primate research organizations.

The research team carried out a survey in many areas at the same time over a total length of 139 kilometers at 150 points on Son Tra peninsula. Scientists found 1,335 doucs, belonging to 237 groups.

He said the results of the survey show that efforts to protect doucs in Son Tra have brought results. This also means that Vietnam still has opportunities to preserve the primate.

“The locality’s development plan should be adjusted. Son Tra must not turn into an accommodation and resort center,” he said.

Vu Ngoc Thanh from the Hanoi University of Natural Sciences said there was no need to carry out a survey again to find the exact number of doucs.

“It doesn’t matter how many red shanked doucs there are in Son Tra. What we need to focus now on is preserving the precious primate if their habitat is affected by resort projects,” Thanh said.

“Some analysts say villas and resorts in the areas 200 meters above sea water would not affect biodiversity and the doucs. However, this is precisely the area with the richest biodiversity. This is also the area where doucs look for food,” Thanh said.

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Diverting aid to fund waste collection will save lives and clean the ocean, says charity

UK government should make tenfold increase in the amount of aid spent on dealing with plastic waste, says Tearfund
Sandra Laville The Guardian 21 Dec 17;

The British government should divert hundreds of millions of pounds from its aid budget to help developing countries clear up their waste and reduce marine plastic pollution, a charity has said.

The development charity Tearfund is in talks with senior government figures, and hopes to persuade ministers to increase the spending on waste and rubbish collection in the developing world from a few million pounds to hundreds of millions a year.

Environment secretary Michael Gove has spoken recently of how he has been left haunted by the scale of marine plastic pollution exposed on Blue Planet 2 and is urging more of the UK’s development budget to be spent helping countries tackle plastic waste.

Tearfund argues the impact of increasing spending will be huge, tackling a public health crisis in developing countries created by waste mountains and contributing to reducing plastic pollution of the oceans.

The British government contributes less than 0.3% of its £13bn aid budget – less than £39m – to rubbish and waste management in developing countries.

Tearfund is pressing for donor nations across the world to increase spending to 3%, which would amount to around £390m a year for the UK, but which the charity says would have a major impact on reducing marine litter.

Joanne Green from Tearfund said many developing countries were trying to tackle plastic waste but did not have systems in place to deal with the scale of the problem. The charity helps support community groups in Brazil and Nigeria who are trying to tackle a growing plastic waste mountain that affects their health and life expectancy.

“In Africa 12 countries have attempted to implement plastic bag bans, for example, and so far only Rwanda has really managed it successfully. It shows there is a desire there and a realisation of the problem, because waste in developing countries is going through the roof. It is expected to double in the next 15-20 years primarily because of increased consumption, and as developing countries adopt western-style disposable economies:

“But they don’t have the waste management systems in place to deal with it. This is a major cause of marine litter.”

A recent study revealed that 90% of marine plastic pollution comes from 10 rivers which are all in developing countries; two in Africa and eight in Asia. The report found that the more waste in an area is not disposed of properly, the more plastic ultimately ends up in the river and eventually the sea.

More than 8m tonnes of plastic enters the oceans each year and plastic fibres have been found in drinking water around the world.

Much of the increased plastic waste is from bottled water products. The Guardian revealed that a million plastic bottles are bought around the world every minute, the vast majority bottled water, and consumption will increase to more than half a trillion by 2012.

“The waste creates huge health issues in developing countries because a lot of it is burnt,” said Green. She said 270,000 people a year die from respiratory diseases related to burnt waste. Other health problems were caused by waste plastic clogging up drains and rivers, causing life-threatening diseases.

Green said increased spending on supporting developing countries to clear and recycle their waste plastic, would improve local health and reduce marine pollution. “At the moment very little aid is spent globally on waste, and it is a problem which is growing hugely as a middle class develops in many countries,” she said. “The development community has not caught up with this and donor countries have not caught up with this; it is a public health crisis.”

Penny Mordaunt, the international development secretary, has been in meetings with NGOs, as part of efforts to stem the flow of marine litter.

Gove is expected to back a plastic bottle deposit scheme in the new year as part of a plan to improve recycling rates.

A spokeswoman for the Department for International Development, which manages 74% of the aid budget said: “The environment secretary and international development secretary are working together to see what more we can do in this area.

“Their departments have a strong record of work on the environment and development – and tackling marine pollution is a good example of where we can apply the government’s joint strengths.

“The issue will be on the agenda for next year’s Commonwealth Summit being held here in the UK, and that will provide a further opportunity to show global leadership in tackling this critical issue.”

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