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Indonesia’s Environmental Peril

By ASM Nurunnabi
***Across Indonesia, more than 30,000people sought treatment for respiratory problems. In Singapore, similarly a large number of people were affected. In Kuala Lumpur, schools ordered the children to stay indoors. Embassies offered their staff an escape to Australia or any other place without smoke.***
INDONESIA'S man-made fires were the result of spread of that country's oil-palm plantations. Satellite pictures have shown that most of the companies which started the fires are Involved in oil-palm plantations which were in the midst of frenzied expansion as international demand for palm-oil surged.
According to official estimates. fire so far swept through more than 80.000 hectares of land in Sumatra. Kalimatan, Sulawesi and Irian Java. That's nothing compared to a 1982-83 blaze that wiped out more than 3.6 million hectares. But this year's debilitating smoke was sufficient to spark the declaration of a national disaster in early September last.
Observers say that the zeal to keep clearing land for plantations Is difficult to extinguish. Last year. Indonesian exports of palm-oil and palm-oil products were worth more than $1 billion, boosted by growing global consumption of palm-oil products. Official encouragement of the palm-oil industry is partly responsible for the plantation boom. Setting fire to the forest and bush is the cheapest, quickest way to clear land for plantations. Plantation development also serves the government’s long standing goal of relocating people from densely populated Java to the other islands. Official incentives include low-cost financing for estates where 80 per cent of the land belong to small holders transmigrants and 2 per cent to the companies engaged in oil-palm plantations.
The sad thing is that the large-scale fire creating noxious smoke take place every year. The cycle starts during the Au gust dry season, Indonesian agricultural companies and small farmers set smoky fires to clear land. Neighbouring Singa pore, Malaysia and Brunel suf fer for a few days, then the September rains usually douse the flames for another year But this year the rains came late, creating an unprecedented health emergency and confronting Southern Asian neighbours with their glaring inability to come up with a regional solution
This year, at least: Indonesia conceded that Its own short comings were partly to blame
Indonesian President apologised to a meeting of regional environment ministers. The effects of the widespread haze took heavy tools in terms of suffering for the affected people. Across Indonesia, more than 30.000 people sought treatment for respiratory problems. In Singapore. similarly a large number of people were affected. In Kuala Lumpur, schools ordered the children to stay indoors. Embassies offered their staff an escape to Australia or any other place without smoke.
The Malaysian Air Force seeded clouds to no effect. The Malaysians redirected their Air Force to fly water-bombing missions over Sumatra, and they dispatched 1.200 fire-fighters aboard two naval ships to help Indonesia to cope with the mess. Japan sent water cannons. and the Philippines and Thailand also offered help as the smoke threatened their southern tourist resorts.
Like great stretches of Indonesia. the industrial city of Medan was shrouded in smoke from forest fire on 3rd October. Visibility was poor as an Indonesian plane with a large number of passengers attempted to land into a blanket of haze. The landing attempt resulted in a crash that killed all 234 passengers and crew mem bers. The question arose : did the haze cause the worst air accident in Indonesia s history? Only a detailed investigation which was under way could determine that.
There was no doubt that the steps taken by some of the members of ASEAN for managing the smog crisis reflected the groupings gospel of regional self-reliance In taking the lead in this respect. Indonesia moved with unusual transparency The environment and forestry ministries publicised the names of suspected companies and put out short TV spots slamming corporate irresponsibility What most pleased tne non government organisa tions was that the government s new willingness to punish most of the corporate culprits rather than on the slash and-burn farmers, as In previous years "The fire is only a symptom of the takeover of people s land by big business.' commented an environmentalist
The smog which swept across Southeast Asia forest
fires in Indonesia clouded this year's 30th anniversary celebrations of the regional club. ASEAN, Behind all the hoopla about solidarity and cooperation, the acrid air strained the consensual style of the nine-member group, and the principle of non-Interference in members’ domestic affairs
Mounting anger in Malaysia and Singapore, where the health and livlihood of millions of people were threatened, had thrust ASEAN into uncharted territory. The crisis tested the skills of its leaders to set aside traditional ASEAN niceties and come up with measures to tackle the problem that transcended national boundaries.
The smoke, choking the region. prompted unusually blunt criticism of Indonesia from ASEAN countries that normally treat the group's largest member with deference. In Singapore and Malaysia — officials, the media and ordinary citizens charged that Indonesia had not done enough to stamp out the fires, which reportedly damaged 750,000 hectares of forest land on the Islands of Burma and Sumatra.
Over the past three decades. ASEAN has evolved from a diverse collection of countries with deep-seated hostilities into a security grouping with a powerful voice In international affairs. But the prolonged haze confronted ASEAN for the first time with a serious multilateral problem.
Smoke from Indonesian forest fires has engulfed the region in the past — in the earlv 1980s in 1991 and again In 1994 After the 1994 episode, regional officials cobbled together an ASEAN Cooperation Plan on Transboundary Pollution It outlined several proposals, including an agreement to exchange information and technology to prevent fires. But little happened since
According to knowledgeable quarters, the best cure for such smogs would be to scale back ambitious plantation targets and revise land used policies There are however others who hold out hope that the planta tlon companies will stop bum Ing and turn to other methods of land clearing Until that hap pens Indonesia s neighbours should not hold their breath tor a smog free future.