18/04/2011 (Carbon Positive) - More than three months after a landmark moratorium on deforestation in Indonesia was due to take effect, the initiative is not in place as Jakarta battles to resolve the details of the forest clearing ban. Last year, Norway offered Indonesia $1 billion under a deal that would see Jakarta place a two-year moratorium on forest clearing. The deal is at the frontline of global efforts to establish a REDD+ mechanism to halt deforestation in developing countries and is being watched closely around the world.

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono was hailed for his part in the agreement but has since struck much domestic resistance to its implementation. He is awaiting the drafting of a decree needed to bring in the required laws but the devil lies in the detail of what’s included in the ban and what’s not.

Whether forest concessions already granted over millions of hectares should be included, and whether so-called secondary forests, which have been degraded but are growing back, are to be encompassed, lie at the heart of the challenges being tackled by a government REDD+ Task Force charged with drafting the decree.

The Forestry Ministry wants to concessions to be honoured, with a cap on further forest clearing at the 26 million hectares already granted. Greenpeace says this would see little decrease in Indonesia’s high deforestation rate. It and other green groups say these areas include some high-value native forests and carbon-rich peatlands. And they say lower value secondary forests must also be included if the moratorium is to be effective, as these are significant areas of forest cover and often targeted by commercial logging and agriculture interests for clearing.

Kuntoro Mangkusubroto, head of the REDD+ Task Force, said in January that all standing forests would be protected but that defining exactly what is ‘forest’ is no simple matter. The Palm Oil Producers Association and the giant local palm oil and paper producer Sinar Mas are said to have been lobbying hard behind the scenes to limit the moratorium’s coverage.

The Forestry minister says that if forest clearing is capped at 26 million hectares and many more millions of hectares of degraded land are utilised, then this should allow for business expansion and appropriate forest preservation. Indonesia also has a target to double palm oil production by 2020. 

A draft of the moratorium decrees is reported to have been passed to the vice-president for review before forwarding to the president.