Demand for Palm Oil in Indonesia
IS There a Link with Dispossession of Peasants in Kalimantan?
Indonesia is becoming greener and spies palm oil as a valuable future export product. Yet there are accusations of dispossession of peasants in western Kalimantan.
The Indonesian government has made significant progress not just in pushing through social and economic reforms but also in promoting the greening of the country. It has one big incentive to work towards more environmentally sustainable sources of energy in the world – the many thousands of islands which make up the archipelago of Indonesia offer numerous suitable sites in which trees for palm oil can be grown. Palm oil has become one of the developing world’s most promising new resources as the world slowly wobbles towards contemplating the real impact of global climate change. It is far from clear that palm oil itself is actually quite such a boon as it has been painted in some quarters but, be that as it may, the Indonesian government has fastened on it as a valuable future export.
This is all very well and the country’s aim to overtake Malaysia to become the world’s leading producer of palm oil is well on its way to coming to fruition. However, there is a negative aspect to this: far away from the world’s gaze, some (and by no means all) of the companies which have been awarded concessions to develop land to plant palms have fallen from the highest standards. The infrastructure of Indonesia is very limited in many places away from the better developed areas of Java. It is possible for unscrupulous companies to fall into illegally forcing peasants from the land they and their families have farmed for generations. Reports from West Kalimantan, in particular, describe farmers waking up one morning to find their land to have been completely denuded of trees and plants. With no other resources, farmers are forced into leaving their home to search for work elsewhere, which in turn leads to more social problems.
One of the main problems causing this is the lack of clear, transparent guidelines for land ownership. In common with most countries in Southeast Asia, peasants occupy their land on the basis of long-term rights akin in some ways to squatters’ rights – but these rights have no basis in law and, once people are brushed off the land, there is little recompense that they can seek. International non-governmental organizations are active in the area and are doing what they can to bring injustices to the eyes of the world. They are also bringing attention to the possibilities that large western companies may be using supplies from companies behaving in unacceptable ways. The ability of such groups to raise concerns around the world from some of the more remote parts of the world is one of the more important aspects of global consumer society in the twenty-first century.
