Sumatra’s Bukit Tigapuluh: a natural asset under threat

Sumatra’s Bukit Tigapuluh landscape is one of the worlds richest collections of lowland rainforest, biodiversity, and site of the world’s only successful Orangutan rehabilitation program. Margaret Swink’s great depiction of…

Sumatra Burns, Climate talks simmer

In a twist of fate, Jakarta’s Tempo is reporting that Arif Mundar, one of Indonesia’s climate negotiators, could not make it to the international climate summit in Bangkok because of…

Oil Palm: An illegal threat too

Reuters ran a story this week on illegal palm oil development in Aceh, Indonesia. The story takes an interesting angle, completely ignoring the massive scale of legal oil palm development…

The Waxman – Markey Bill: A step forward for REDD?

In our globalized world, Northern hemisphere dwellers are connected to the rainforests of Indonesia and Papua New Guinea (PNG) more than ever. Images of endless rainforests and isolated communities  have…

Indonesia’s deforestation: no mystery here

A new report published in Environmental Research Letters uses precise satellite imaging to show that the pace of forest clearing in Indonesia steadily increased from 2000-2005. At the end of…