Greenpeace Cries Foul as Eviction Papers Are Served

Greenpeace Cries Foul as Eviction Papers Are Served

Environmental group Greenpeace has lashed out at the Jakarta administration’s decision to seal off its office for zoning violations, calling the move just the latest attack in a corporate-backed smear campaign against the organization.

Greenpeace Southeast Asia media campaigner Hikmat Soeriatanuwijaya said the group had been unfairly targeted.

“The continued attacks against Greenpeace started when we launched our global campaign against Asia Pulp and Paper by exposing evidence of APP forest destruction in early June this year,” he said.

He declined, however, to say who Greenpeace believed was behind the smear campaign.

“Although we know who it is, we don’t want to mention the particular company or party because we don’t have a capacity to investigate it,” Hikmat said.

The statements came as the Jakarta Building Control and Monitoring Office (P2B) said it had served notice to Greenpeace on Wednesday about the closure and would proceed with sealing off its office on Jalan Kemang Utara in South Jakarta next Monday.

Agus Supriyono, P2B’s head of enforcement, said the office had been built in an area designated for residential buildings only.

“Like any other building that violates regulations, we will have to seal off this building,” he said.

“We will only unseal it once the building owners have restored it as a residential property. So that means that come Monday, Greenpeace must stop all activities at its office.”

Agus denied that his office had been pressured by outside parties to move against Greenpeace, calling the matter a simple zoning issue. He added that an office building next to the Greenpeace office would also be sealed off.

However, several other office and commercial buildings on the same street have been allowed to operate as usual.

“We don’t have a problem with Greenpeace. We’re just doing our job, which is to enforce zoning regulations and take measures against violating buildings,” Agus said.

“If Greenpeace wants to relocate its offices, they’re welcome to do so, just as long as they do so in an area where it’s permissible.”

Widyo Dwiyono, head of the South Jakarta P2B office, echoed the point that the entire Kemang area was designated as a residential zone, making it imperative that Greenpeace move.

Kemang is also home to scores of restaurants, bars, nightclubs and shops, very few of which have ever been sealed off or cited for zoning violations.

Hikmat said Greenpeace found it humorous how its “persecutor” kept coming up with different ways of attacking the organization, including past allegations that it was funded by lottery money and that it was intent on stalling Indonesian economic development by attacking the country’s palm oil industry.

“We’re not against the palm oil industry, nor do we want to stop Indonesian economic development,” he said. “All we are asking for is responsible industrial practices by implementing sustainable industrial development rather than destroying and exploiting the rainforest.

“It needs to be understood that Greenpeace’s campaigns focus on saving the Indonesian rainforest, hence we continue to urge all companies to save the rainforest through sustainable industrial development.”

Hikmat added that Greenpeace was aware it faced opposition to its work, but said attacks and pressure would not stop it from campaigning for better environmental stewardship.

“We just hope that the media and society don’t get the wrong idea about our mission in Indonesia because we just want to save the Indonesian rainforest,” he said.

Last month, a Greenpeace UK forest campaigner was deported from Indonesia for reasons that were never made clear. That incident took place less than a week after the Greenpeace UK director was denied entry into the country despite arriving with a valid visa.

Nur Hidayati, head of Greenpeace Indonesia, said at the time that the group was “coming under attack in Indonesia because of our work to stop deforestation in the country.”

Lawmakers and religious leaders have publicly questioned the source of the group’s funding, while hard-line groups have claimed it is working in the country illegally because it is not registered with the Jakarta administration.

Critics of Greenpeace have also accused it of targeting APP while ignoring foreign companies that operate in Indonesia. APP, though, is foreign, being based in Singapore.

US to Help Capital Clean Up Its Act

US to Help Capital Clean Up Its Act

The United States’ Environmental Protection Agency met with key stakeholders in Jakarta on Monday in a bid to reduce the city’s suffocating air pollution.

Michelle DePass, an assistant administrator at the EPA, said the meeting provided valuable insights into pinpointing the root causes of Jakarta’s deteriorating air quality.

“This stakeholder meeting is a key opportunity for us to have a discussion,” she said. “But we realize that long-term cooperation [with stakeholders in Jakarta] is needed. We need to work very hard to be able to provide a long-term benefit.”

Last month, the Environment Ministry signed a memorandum of understanding with the EPA designed to strengthen environmental corporation between the United States and Indonesia, and to work on pollution reduction in Jakarta.

The so-called Breathe Easy Jakarta program aims to address the air pollution problem in Jakarta and establish cost-effective strategies for improving air quality and public health.

DePass said the EPA and the Jakarta government would cooperate in areas such as air quality monitoring, compiling emissions inventories, air quality modeling, health assessments and the development of air pollution control strategies. The partnership, she said, would involved capacity building, transfer of technology and some pilot programs.

Karliansyah, a deputy minister for pollution control at the Environment Ministry, said the meeting was hoped to establish a commitment among all stakeholders to work to improve Jakarta’s air quality. “It requires cooperation from all stakeholders to reduce air pollution in Jakarta,” he said. “We need to establish commitment and encourage coordination between the government and stakeholders.”

Karliansyah said that as part of Breathe Easy Jakarta, the government hoped to improve air quality management and work to develop an information system that to manage air pollution.

Jakarta Governor Fauzi Bowo said Greater Jakarta already had a supporting bylaw to implement the Breathe Easy Jakarta program.

“In this case, Jakarta is the only province in Indonesia that already has a regulation on reducing air pollution,” Fauzi said. “So, instead of establishing a regulation, we can just jump to action.”

Karliansyah said Jakarta needed to address the transportation sector, which contributes around 23 percent of the city’s air pollution.

“The increasing number of motorcycles has an impact not only on fuel consumption and heavy traffic but also air pollution,” he said.

Fauzi said that Jakarta was trying to reduce carbon emissions from vehicles by conducting regular emission tests. “This action can reduce air pollution significantly,” he said.

Karliansyah added some action had also been taken at the central government level such as discarding the use of a lead additive in gasoline in 2001 and developing better mass transportation such as the Transjakarta busway.

City in Uphill Battle to Clean Polluted Rivers

City in Uphill Battle to Clean Polluted Rivers

A city official has admitted that there would be no end to the dredging of Jakarta’s rivers as long as people keep dumping waste in them. 

Suprapto, head of rivers and coastal areas at the Jakarta Public Works Office, said on Tuesday that no amount of clean-up efforts would suffice as long as residents continued to choke the city’s waterways with trash. “Every day the Public Works Office dredges up to 27,000 cubic meters of plastic trash from Jakarta’s rivers,” he said. 

“We might have the necessary equipment to keep doing it, but every day there’s just more and more plastic waste in the water. So it’s really up to the citizens to dispose of their domestic waste properly, whether plastic or liquid, because the city is already doing all its can to clean up the rivers.” 

He added that besides degrading water quality, the trash also hampered the flow of the rivers, making them flood more easily during heavy rains.

“The damage to river basin areas and the subsequent flooding are basically due to the constriction of the water flow because of the amount of waste being dumped,” he said. 

“Take the Pesanggrahan River [in South Jakarta], for instance. The water quality there is exceptionally bad. Since 2008, we’ve had to dredge it three times just to restore normal water flow.” 

Rusman Sagala, head of conservation and environmental management at the Jakarta Environmental Management Agency (BPLHD), said the Pesanggrahan was heavily polluted with both biological and chemical contaminants. 

“According to our data, 82 percent of the pollution in the river comes from domestic waste, either the liquid or plastic,” he said. “That’s because all the waste is going directly into the river untreated.” 

He added it was important for citizens to break the habit of dumping waste into waterways. 

“We can’t keep our eyes on all Jakarta residents, 24 hours a day, fining them for throwing waste into the rivers,” he said. 

“That’s impossible, so that’s why we need urge citizen involvement to address this issue.” 

Separately, Jakarta officials welcomed an offer by private water operator Aetra to revise its contract with the city, which officials previously complained would have left the city with mounting debts. 

“I appreciate Aetra’s offer to revise the contract that thus far has tended to be to the city’s disadvantage,” Governor Fauzi Bowosaid. 

“I hope the city’s other water operator now follows suit,” he added, referring to PAM Lyonnaise Jaya (Palyja). 

Under the current contract, the city subsidizes Aetra for providing piped water to residents. That leaves it unable to raise prices for consumers until a minimum standard of service has been attainted. 

The proposed revision would tie the payment of subsidies to the operator’s performance in providing a reliable water supply and bringing in new customers. 

Mohamad Selim, Aetra’s president director, said revising the contract would not be to the company’s detriment. 

“I’m optimistic that Aetra won’t lose out, even taking into account inflation and rising costs of production,” he said. 

“We’ve calculated the risks and found that we will still stand to profit.”

Polluted Flood Canal Offers Poor Residents Tainted Catch

Polluted Flood Canal Offers Poor Residents Tainted Catch

When 80-year-old Madi has no money to buy food for him and his wife, he casts a net in the polluted waters of the East Flood Canal hoping to haul in fish. 

The waters are often caked with foam from detergent used by nearby houses or even industrial waste dumped in rivers flowing into the canal, also known as the BKT. 

However, this doesn’t bother Madi, a resident of Duren Sawit in East Jakarta, who will settle for a tainted catch. 

“I have learned my lesson,” he said on Tuesday. “I cannot cook the fish immediately because if I do, I will get stomach aches.” 

The health hazards caused by this practice have not stopped impoverished communities around the canal from fishing there. 

Madi said that after he fell ill from eating fish caught from the BKT, he learned to soak the catch in a bucket for several days before cooking it. 

Aos Rosyidin, 55, a resident of Malaka Sari subdistrict in Duren Sawit, has also learned how to avoid disease even if he eats fish caught from the canal. 

“The problem is that [the people who get sick] do not handle the fish properly,” he said. 

“The fish need to be cleaned first by putting them in a bucket with fresh water for three or four days before they are ready to be cooked.” 

The 23 kilometer-long BKT, built to ease flooding in East and North Jakarta, pools water from the Ciliwung, Cililitan, Cipinang, Sunter, Buaran, Jati Kramat and Cakung rivers. 

However, authorities said those rivers had become polluted by industrial and household waste, making fishing for food at the BKT dangerous. 

According to October 2010 data from 45 monitoring posts of the Jakarta Environmental Management Agency (BPLHD), 82 percent of the capital’s rivers are “heavily polluted.” The rest were categorized as either slightly or moderately polluted. 

Pitoyo Subandrio, head of the Public Works Ministry’s Ciliwung-Cisadane Agency, which oversees the flood canal, has confirmed that pollutants have tainted the BKT. 

Though the government has not issued a ban on fishing at the BKT, officials said last month that they were trying to address water quality problems by threatening suspensions or water-pipe blockage to companies that continued to dump waste into rivers. 

Dian Wiwekowati, head of natural resources management at the BPLHD, said all industrial or commercial activities disposing of wastewater needed a valid permit from the governor. 

Peni Susa n ti, head of the BPLHD, said the permit was necessary to limit the amount of wastewater being dumped into the city’s 13 rivers. 

For now, though, concerns about water-borne diseases or food poisoning fail to discourage poor residents from using the BKT, which has seen marine life grow since the long-delayed project was completed in 2009. 

Ratim, a waiter from Pondok Bambu, said fellow residents went to the canal “almost daily” to bring home fish for their families. For him, however, fishing is a hobby, and he claims to have once caught four kilograms of fish at the canal. 

“Before the BKT was built, I used to go fishing at the river near the [mosque] in Pondok Bambu,” he said on Tuesday. 

Ratim has frequented the BKT enough to know when the fish taste good based on the canal’s water level. 

“I usually don’t get many fish when the water [level is low], but the fishes usually taste better,” he said. 

“I think it is because when the water is receding, the water is cleaner so the fishes do not have a weird taste, like oil.”

Fishers’ Empty Nets a Indonesia Disaster: Activists

Fishers’ Empty Nets a Indonesia Disaster: Activists

Environmental activists on Tuesday called on the Indonesian government to declare the inability of fishing families nationwide to earn a living because of months of bad weather a national disaster.

“The national disaster status is crucial because it would smoothen the coordination process between the central government and the regional government for the distribution of relief aid,” said Riza Damanik, the secretary general of the Fisheries Justice Coalition (Kiara).

Raising the current social disaster status to national disaster would allow the state to provide more relief assistance to the affected fishermen.

“The Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency [BMKG] has said the bad weather will last at least until April,” Riza said.

Earlier, the Social Affairs Ministry had said that to help nearly 474,000 fishermen — and their families — whose livelihoods have been affected, the maritime affairs and fisheries minister, Fadel Muhammad, had asked district heads and governors to dip into rice reserves and funds from the Social Affairs Ministry.

Salim Segaf Al Jufri, the social affairs minister, said his ministry had already distributed about Rp 540 billion ($60 million) in development funds to regional governments to help the fishermen and their families.

However, environmental watchdogs say this isn’t enough, arguing that the government first has to get its numbers right.

Selamet Daryoni, the director of urban environment at the Indonesian Green Institute, questioned the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries’ data on the number of fishermen.

“The Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries, for instance, has only listed 3,084 fishermen in the Thousand Islands and Muara Angke [in Jakarta],” Slamet said. But he added there were other fishing villages in Jakarta, with more than 6,000 fishermen in places such as Marunda, Muara Baru, Kali Baru, Cilincing, Muara Tawar and Kamal Muara.

“If more than 6,000 fishermen living only 20 kilometers from the Presidential Palace are ignored by the government, what about the other fishermen in other parts of Indonesia?” he said.

The government’s mistakes in this regard, Slamet suggested, should not be tolerated. Oversights could have disastrous effects on the lives of thousands of citizens, he said.

Riza concurred, adding that many more fishing families were suffering than the government suggested. He said the actual number of fishermen across the country who had been unable to catch fish in the past months was far larger than what the state had estimated.

He said that at least 550,000 fishermen in 53 districts and municipalities across the archipelago had been affected by freakish weather conditions.

“At the moment the government only provides 13,721 tons of rice every two weeks,” he said, adding that more was needed.

Riza also said inaccurate data would influence the kind and amount of aid the government would provide.

“The government needs to do a lot more to help out more than 550,000 fishermen and women during bad weather conditions,” said Tejo Wahyu Jatmiko, the coordinator of the Alliance for Prosperous Villages.

Dedy Ramanta, the national secretary of the Indonesian Traditional Fishermen’s Association (KNTI), criticized the government for only reacting to deteriorating conditions and not preparing a long-term strategy to deal with the effects of climate change, especially for fishermen whose livelihood options are limited.

“The government needs to implement an insurance program and also give capital assistance so they can build small businesses,” he added.

Tiharom, 35, a traditional fisherman from Marunda in North Jakarta, said that in order to feed his family, he was now making sandals and doormats from garment industry waste.

He said that as a fisherman he could earn up to Rp 80,000 in one outing, enough to feed his family of six.

“However, now that the bad weather has really stopped me from going out to sea, I am trying to build a small business by turning garment waste into strong ropes and then producing sandals and doormats,” he said.

However, supply of materials and marketing posed serious problems, he added.

“I am not sure if this job will go anywhere or whether it will just keep me busy during the bad weather,” he said.

Forest Concessions to Be Granted in Logged Land

Forest Concessions to Be Granted in Logged Land

The Forestry Ministry has announced that 500,000 hectares of land concessions will be granted this year in previously logged areas as part of a wider plan to keep virgin forests intact and slow the rate of carbon dioxide emissions.

Hadi Daryanto, the ministry’s director general of forestry management, said on Thursday that opening these concessions in so-called degraded forests would ensure that natural and peat forests remained untouched.

“Indonesia has 35.4 million hectares of degraded forest that we can designate as agricultural and forest concessions,” he said.

“By using degraded forests instead of virgin forests, we can develop more concessions and keep emissions low, as well as providing jobs in the forestry sector.”

The government sells permits each year to use publicly owned land for specific purposes such as agriculture, logging and mining. Prices for such concessions vary depending on the land’s location and intended use. The concessions are handed out throughout the year.

Last year, 487,744 hectares of such concessions came from degraded forests, surpassing the Forestry Ministry’s target of 450,000 hectares.

Hadi said reusing previously logged land was part of the government’s plan to suspend the issuance of new concessions in peat and primary natural forests.

The moratorium is part of a bilateral deal with Norway that went into effect on Saturday, the first day of 2011. In return for the moratorium, Norway will provide $1 billion in funding for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD-Plus) schemes.

“Besides implementing the Indonesia-Norway agreement, we can also use this to attain our national emissions reduction target of 26 percent by 2020,” Hadi said. “At the same time, it gives the ministry a role in helping to achieve the GDP growth target of 7 percent by 2014.”

He said the target for new concessions this year was up from 2010 because of an increased demand for wood pulp.

“Even though there’s rising demand for wood pulp, and hence for forest concessions, we’ve already mapped out the projected concessions so there’s no possibility of clearing natural or peat forests,” he said.

Hadi also said that because the issuance of land concessions was a lucrative business, the government was concerned about parties posing as brokers for investors seeking permits.

“We need a monitoring team to supervise the implementation of the moratorium on new concessions in peat and natural forests,” he said.

Mas Achmad Santosa, an environmental law expert, said the effective implementation of the moratorium could only be ensured with firm legal support.

“It will take some time before the government issues a policy as the legal instrument to back the moratorium,” he said.

“Therefore it’d be better if the president issued a decree on implementing the moratorium.”

Mas said that besides the lack of a legal foundation, the moratorium was threatened by the prospect of regional administrations not acting in line with the central government’s logging policy.

“One thing we need to be concerned about is the possibility of regional administrations issuing their own concessions in natural and peat forests,” he said.

“With regional autonomy now in place, regional administrations are under pressure to raise their own income.”

WWF, NU Team Up for Green Campaign

WWF, NU Team Up for Green Campaign

The environmental group WWF has joined forces with Nahdlatul Ulama, the country’s biggest Islamic organization, in an effort to preserve the environment by raising public awareness of the issue.

Nyoman Iswarayoga, director of climate and energy issues at WWF-Indonesia, said on Monday that his group was eager to work with large organizations in a bid to spread the message about saving the environment.

“It’s easier to approach the public through a mass organization that is connected to a group of followers,” he said.

“This is actually not the first time we’ve engaged with mass organizations, including religious ones, for this purpose. For instance, we held a public discussion on preserving the environment from an Islamic perspective in Aceh before the 2004 tsunami.”

He was speaking after the signing of a memorandum of understanding between the WWF and NU.

Efransjah, head of WWF-Indonesia, said the agreement called for a combination of environmental conservation and religious values to deal with the impact of climate change.

“We’re confident that the wide network of organizations under NU will help us to raise public awareness about preserving the environment and the country’s biodiversity,” he said.

NU has a history of campaigning on environment-related issues. In 2004, it set up a community-based disaster risk management body to address issues such as flooding and landslides resulting from deforestation.

In March this year, it renamed the body the Disaster and Climate Change Board (LPBI-NU) to better reflect its wider focus on addressing the impact of climate change.

Avianto Muhtadi, head of the LPBI-NU, said that since its 2004 inception the board had worked with various local and international environmental organizations to set up community programs, backed by local clerics, to help preserve the environment.

“NU has 70 million followers and a network of 15,000 pesantren [Islamic boarding schools] in Indonesia,” he said.

“To get the message across to them, we’ll draft material for a dakwah [a campaign through preaching] and train local clerics to present it.”

Avianto said the material would be drafted based on “Islamic values and national or international environmental laws, such as the Hyogo Framework and Indonesia’s 2007 Law on Disaster Management.”

The Hyogo Framework for Action 2005-15 aims to identify ways to build countries’ and communities’ resilience to disasters.

“So far we’ve reached our goals in several districts in Indonesia,” Avianto said. “For instance, we’ve planted 12,000 trees in Jember district in East Java.”

Iswarayoga said while Monday’s signing marked the first formal agreement between the WWF and NU, the two had worked together on environmental issues for the past four years.

As part of the agreement, he said, both sides would set up climate change adaptation programs for different district, tailored to the kinds of problems they were facing.

“We’ll have to identify what kind of problems they have because each district will have a different issue,” Iswarayoga said.

Tune Your Radios to a Greener Jakarta

Tune Your Radios to a Greener Jakarta

For those stuck twirling the dial during smoggy commutes, Green Radio is a breath of fresh air for those who like their news mixed with a daily dose of environmental responsibility.

Broadcasting on 89.2-FM, Green Radio is the only news station in Jakarta whose main focus is educating listeners about the big and small changes they can make to benefit the environment.

“Green Radio was inspired by the floods in 2007 that left more than 70 percent of the Jakarta area drowned,” said Santosa, the station’s managing director. “There must be something wrong with the environment, so one day I came up with an idea to change our previous station, Radio Utan Kayu, which focused on more general issues, to Green Radio.”

The station’s tag line is “The eco-lifestyle of Jakarta,” and Santosa said more than 200,000 people tune in daily across Greater Jakarta to listen to news, environmental reports and discussions.

And the small station’s influence extends beyond the reach of its radio transmitters. Besides broadcasting a message urging environmental consciousness, Green Radio has also spearheaded programs aimed at getting their audience actively involved. “Green Radio has on-air activities and also off-air activities because we want to encourage the public, through our listeners, to get involved to save the planet and help to avoid floods in Jakarta such as the 2007 flood,” Santosa said.

And it isn’t all just talk. From day one, Green Radio has used solar panels to power its 18-hour broadcast day.

“I decided to use solar panels because they are very environmentally friendly and use an unlimited natural resource: the sun,” Santosa said.

So far, Green Radio has organized three initiatives: the Friends of the Forest tree adoption campaign at Gunung Gede Pangrango National Park, a clean-up of the area around Monas in June and a biopore creation workshop. Biopores are small holes drilled in the ground to decrease flooding.

Green Radio collaborates with private sector and government organizations as well as members of its audience, Santosa said, adding that the station has had more than 2000 individual participants take part in its greening programs.

Through its Friends of the Forest adoption program, individuals and organizations donate Rp 108,000 ($12) to have a tree planted in a deforested area in Gunung Gede Pangrango National Park in West Java. Green Radio has collected enough money to plant 7,031 trees in a 10-hectare area over the last 18 months, decreasing soil erosion at the farms that line the park’s borders.

“We’ve already got 15 big organizations and 300 individual adopters,” Santosa said. The program was created in partnership with the park and Conservation International Indonesia.

He added that the program was also helping reclaim parts of the forest from local farmers who use the park to plant crops, and trains those farmers for new careers in eco-tourism. At a cost of Rp 290,000 per person for two days and one night, the tour provides lodgings in a campground or tree house, five meals, guides, porters and the planting of a tree.

“The income goes to local farmers who help us organize the eco-tours. They prepare the food and act as forest guides and porters.” Santosa said, adding that some farmers were also given goats, rabbits and honeybees to breed.

In addition to Friends of the Forest, Green Radio has also developed a biopore program, active since July 2009.

“The biopore program is a regular training program that teaches people how to make small holes [in the ground] for water absorption. They can absorb more water in the rainy season and also can be used to produce compost.” Santosa said.

Each biopore is designed with a 10-centimeter opening and with a depth of one meter.

Through partnership with the Body Shop retail chain and Mall Ciputra, Green Radio’s program has been responsible for the creation of 1,500 biopores across Jakarta.

“We are working together with these caring communities to help reach the government’s goal of creating one million biopores,” Santosa said. “Hopefully, these biopores will help us to avoid another big flood like the Jakarta flood in 2007.”