Environmental Hazard

Lifefocus

Tuesday December 11, 2007

Environmental hazard

PT TABUNG Haji Gambut Plantation oil palm plantation covers a sprawling 82,000ha in Riau, Sumatra. The subsidiary of Tabung Haji Holdings is potentially the biggest oil palm grower in the province; it has 200,000ha of oil palm plantation.

And it is also inevitably responsible for huge carbon emissions from degraded and drained peatland on which its oil palm trees grow.

Plantation manager Peter Lim Kim Huan said due to a lack of suitable mineral soil, the planting of oil palm on peat soil of more than 1.5m in depth has been expand ing in the last 10 years. Planting began in 1997 in logged-over forests and 80% of the peat soil is more than 1.5m deep.

“We set aside 10,000ha as a buffer, and maintain the water table between 80cm and 100cm below the peat surface,” he told a recent workshop to address the impact of palm oil and biofuel production on peat lands, biodiversity and climate change.

Wetlands International (Indonesia) director Nyoman Suryadiputra pointed out that a majority of peat in Riau is deep peat, which is more than 3m in depth. The law in Indonesia stipulates that peat areas deeper than 3m should not be developed but this decree has generally not been enforced.

He cautioned that the assertion by Lim that PT Tabung Haji operates on peat that is more than 1.5m is misleading. “What is more than 1.5m? This is a very tricky fig ure. It could mean more than the permit ted level of 3m,” said Nyoman.

Lim admitted that peat subsidence rate is highest at between 30cm and 50cm in the first two years and stabilises at between 1cm and 2cm thereafter, provided a good water level is maintained.

Undisturbed peat ecosystems have been actively accumulating carbon for thou sands of years. Once cleared of its vegeta tion or drained, it begins to release the car bon. Peat subsidence is the result of carbon oxidation, shrinkage of the peat material and compaction due to human actions in preparing the land for cultivation.

Based on peat subsidence rates over decades, oil palm plantations on peat have a net loss of carbon to the atmos phere. In contrast, well-managed planta tions on mineral soils have a net positive carbon balance, accumulating carbon over time.

Nearly half of the province’s 8.2 million ha is covered by peat swamp forests but since 1982, the forest cover of Riau has shrunk by 57%. Oil palm plantation expan sion saw a steady rise from 600,000ha in 1995 to 1.7 million ha by 2005.

Besides oil palm, peatland in Riau is also desecrated by industrial timber plantation. The two biggest players, Asia Pulp and Paper and Asia Pacific Resources International Holdings Ltd, represent 1.3 million ha of the overall 1.9 million ha pulp and paper plantation.

In past years, poor water management system and the use of fire to prepare the land for oil palm plantations resulted in transboundary haze that engulfed Malaysia. Malaysian companies investing in oil palm plantation in Sumatra and Kalimantan have been implicated for such irresponsible practices.

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