Indonesia Receiving International Financial Support to Stimulate New Green Economy

After a long history of allowing its tropical mangrove forests to be systematically cut down for logging, agricultural, and industrial purposes, as well as being one of the worst offenders with respect to carbon emissions, Indonesia has recently made notable policy changes in an effort to move to a green, more sustainable economy.

Indonesian mangrove forest. Stock photo.

In recognition, the World Bank just approved its first ever developmental policy loan dedicated to climate mitigation and adaptations in Indonesia.

The $200 million loan - to be giving in four yearly installments - is designed to focus on key benefits, according to World Bank, including:

• The promotion of energy efficiency.
• A reduction in the overall use of fossil fuel.
• A reduction in forest loss, and peatland conversion and burning.
• The development of renewable energies, like geothermal and biomass.
• Improving infrastructure for water resource management.
• Improving the ability to respond to water-related climate change impacts, such as droughts and floods.
• Making farmers more prepared for climate change impacts (floods, droughts, and pests) on food production.

In praise, Joachim von Amsberg, World Bank Director for Indonesia, commented that, “Over the last two years, the (Indonesian) government has already managed to bring climate change into the national planning and budgeting process,” referring to the country’s new National Council on Climate Change.

Click to read more ...

Indonesia’s Fight: Commercial Farming vs. Rainforest Preservation

Indigenous hunter in Papuan rainforest. Photo by buzzine.com.

Expanding farm lands to feed ever growing human populations and livestock, or conserving rainforests that many consider the lungs of the Earth?

It’s always a hard question in itself, and in the situation of Indonesia’s Papua province, it’s even more complicated.

As the Rainforest Information Centre puts it - “Rainforests have been called the “Lungs of the Earth,” but the term is misleading. Although rainforests do release vast amounts of oxygen into the atmosphere, they absorb just as much through the decay of organic matter. However, they do play an important role in regulating the Earth’s atmosphere by storing carbon in their biomass. When forests are destroyed, the carbon they contain is released into the atmosphere in the form of carbon dioxide.”

Scientists are forever debating whether global warning is real. Even for those that don’t believe that global warming is real, rainforest deforestation also destroys the habitats of untold numbers of species that make them home. And, lets not forget all the natural medicines that have been discovered and that those that never will.

Click to read more ...