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Indonesian Court Fines Palm Oil Firm $18.5M Over Forest Fires in 2015

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Indonesian Court Fines Palm Oil Firm $18.5M Over Forest Fires in 2015 中文 日本語 English ﴾Chinese﴿ Deutsch ﴾German﴿ Español ﴾Spanish﴿ Français ﴾French﴿ Bahasa Indonesia ﴾Indonesian﴿ Italiano ﴾Italian﴿ ﴾Japanese﴿ Brasil ﴾Portuguese﴿ India Philippines Mongabay.com Newsfeed Sign Up Later RAINFORESTS OCEANS ANIMALS & ENVIRONMENT SOLUTIONS FOR KIDS DONATE IMPACT MORE To search, type and hit enter. Palmtree poison ivy or something similar 3d comes to mind - as something to be Mongabay Series: Global Forests, Indonesian Palm Oil ruled out Can camera traps diagnose the Indonesian court nes palm oil rm $18.5m over forest res in 2015 severity of a mystery gira e skin 1 Reply by Hans Nicholas Jong on 28 October 2019 Flower Fantastic ! Turn it into a manual for the 1m aid community. And pay the Aru people generously for well-earned avoid 10 takeaways from Indonesia’s grassroots #SaveAru success 1 Reply Bowtie It is time to take away Brazil's 25 Oct stewardship of this precious resource of the people of the planet earth...it is As 2019 Amazon res die down, Brazilian deforestation roars ahead 6 Replies Plane Bastards .....!! An Indonesian court has fined a palm oil company $18.5 million for fires that destroyed 26 Oct 970 hectares (2,400 acres) of forest on its concession in Borneo in 2015. Holding social media companies accountable for The judgment is the latest in a growing number of cases where courts have taken a zero- 3 Replies tolerance approach that makes concession holders liable for any fires that occur on their land, regardless of whether or not they can be proven to have started the fires. Observers have welcomed the verdict, but say the challenge now will be to compel the company to pay up. Since 2015 the government has won $223 million in judgments in ChefHat They wanna associate Ayahuasca 3d similar cases, but collected just $5.5 million. with their own primitivism. Who really drinks real Ayahuasca is the 1st one to The company in the latest case, PT Arjuna Utama Sawit, is a supplier to Singapore-based pr Musim Mas Group, a major oil palm trader whose customers include consumer brands Ayahuasca tourism an overlooked such Unilever. Musim Mas said it was seeking an explanation from PT Arjuna Utama driver of trade in jaguar body parts, Sawit. 3 Replies JAKARTA — A court in Indonesia has ordered palm oil company PT Arjuna Utama Mongabay is a non‐profit that depends on support Sawit to pay the equivalent of $18.6 million in fines and damages for fires on its land in from readers like you. Donate here. Borneo in 2015, in the latest instance of a zero-tolerance enforcement approach Tooth Needs to be translated into Bahasa against concession holders. 6d Indonesia and circulated by Mongabay Indonesia! The fires razed 970 hectares (2,400 acres) of forest in Katingan district, Central View targeted feeds How Laos lost its tigers Kalimantan province. The company, a supplier to Singapore-based Musim Mas Group 4 Replies — which has committed to a “no deforestation, no peat and no exploitation” (NDPE) by topic by location policy to ensure the sustainability of its palm oil supplies — holds a concession to manage 16,600 hectares (41,000 acres) in the district. Agriculture Animals Birds Climate Change The Indonesian Ministry of Environment and Forestry sued PT Arjuna Utama Sawit at Conservation Deforestation buzzabout This is so sad. Tragic sad. It is a the court in Palangkaraya, the provincial capital. On Oct. 23, the court found the Energy Featured 23h symptom of the worst disease ever to company violated environmental regulations and ordered it to pay 99.6 billion rupiah Forests Happy‐upbeat Environmetarnish… the human species - a lust for ($7.1 million) in fines to the ministry and 162 billion rupiah ($11.5 million) for the Herps Indigenous Peoples Interviews Mammals ‘Guardian of the Forest’ ambushed environmental damages incurred. and murdered in Brazilian Amazon New Species Oceans 6 Replies Jasmin Ragil Utomo, the ministry’s director of civil litigation, welcomed the ruling, Palm Oil Rainforests although the judgment awarded was less than the total $25.6 million in fines and Technology Wildlife damages that the ministry had sought. A lawyer for the company, meanwhile, told local Many more topics media it would appeal the verdict. Fries 7 YEARS..100 WORKES...1/2 BILION 6d The judgment, while far from the largest won by the state, is notable because it marks DOLAR FOR? Recent Posts the latest instance of a growing push by the government and courts to take a zero- The Ocean Cleanup successfully tolerance stance against companies with fires on their concessions. Rasio Ridho Sani, Ban on destructive fishing practice helps species collects ocean plastic, aims to scale recovery in Indonesian park the environment ministry’s director-general of law enforcement, praised the 2 Replies Palangkaraya court’s use of the concept of strict liability, under which concession RSPO questions effectiveness of Indonesian palm holders are responsible for any fires that occur on their land, regardless of whether plantation moratorium or not they can be proven to have started the fires. The concept has been employed Indonesia protests: Land bill at center of unrest successfully in a number of cases since 2015, when fires razed 2.6 million hectares (6.4 Submarine One has to remember that there is 3d no rule of law in Mexico. The society's million acres) of land — an area larger than the U.S. state of Vermont. culture essentially runs on what coul ‘Guardian of the Forest’ ambushed and murdered in Brazilian Amazon “The verdict shows that land and forest fire is an extraordinary crime,” Rasio said in a 'Rampant' shing continues as press statement. “Companies have to take responsibility for fires on their vaquita numbers dwindle Debate rages over intensive oil palm farming in 1 Reply concessions.” Gabon With Indonesia experiencing another scorching fire season this year, Rasio said the verdict was an important reminder that companies couldn’t evade liability no matter how long ago the burning occurred. teresehart Thank you for bringing up these 26 Oct Social channels important questions and problems “Even if the land and forest fires happened a long time ago, they will still be facing both remote human prosecuted,” he said. “We can track traces [of fires] and evidence of past forest fires FACEBOOK communities and bonobo with the support of experts and technology.” Attached link TWITTER More fires broke out on PT Arjuna Utama Sawit’s concession again earlier this year, Bonobo conservation stymied by INSTAGRAM deforestation, human rights abuses prompting the environment ministry to seal off the affected area. 1 Reply LINKEDIN YOUTUBE RSS/XML AirBalloon The world-famous philosopher of 6d science, Karl Popper, insisted that to be a valid scienti c theory any hypothes Coal power plants ourish in the Advertisement Philippines despite ‘climate emergen... 4 Replies Micah Hugo One of the last rain forests, very 3d unfortunate. Controversial dam gets green light to ood a Philippine protected are... 2 Replies Email Updates Smoke rises from an oil palm plantation on a peatland in Sumatra. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay. Trouble collecting Winning a judgment is one thing; collecting the fines, though, could prove difficult. Prior to the PT Arjuna Utama Sawit, Indonesia had won judgments against nine Podcast companies in forest fire cases since 2015. Those companies were ordered to pay a Our biweekly podcast delivering news & combined 3.15 trillion rupiah ($223 million) in fines, but only one has paid its tab of 78 inspiration from nature’s frontline. billion rupiah ($5.5 million). Greenpeace Indonesia forest campaigner Arie Rompas said the government faced the same challenge this time around. He also called on the environment ministry to revoke Quick updates the company’s permit immediately to prevent it carrying out any more activities, Daily topic‐based news alerts including burning, on the land. Arie said Musim Mas, one of the world’s biggest oil palm traders whose customers include major consumer brands such as Unilever, should also be held responsible for Republish the burning, given that it sourced some of its palm oil from PT Arjuna Utama Sawit. He You may republish Mongabay content in noted Singapore’s transboundary haze pollution act of 2014 that allows the country to your publication at no cost. take legal action against locally registered companies or citizens who commit fire violations in other countries that result in pollution in Singapore. The 2015 fires led to haze spreading beyond Indonesia to Singapore, Malaysia and even Thailand. Responding to the verdict, Musim Mas said it was carrying out an investigation in accordance with its grievance mechanism. “We have immediately reached out to Arjuna Utama Sawit for more information and are currently waiting for their response,” the company told Mongabay. Peatlands buring in Indonesia in 2014 to make way for oil palm. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay. ‘Risky acquisition’ In its lawsuit against PT Arjuna Utama Sawit, the environment ministry had asked the court to prohibit the company from selling its assets or otherwise undergoing any kind of change in ownership. But the court rejected that request, leaving open the possibility that the company could be sold off without paying the fines. Singapore-listed crushed limestone producer GCCP Resources recently announced a plan to fully acquire PT Arjuna Utama Sawit in a reverse takeover deal worth S$220 million ($162 million) that would see the Indonesian company take over the former’s board listing. The acquisition is pending GCCP Resources’ due diligence on the financial, business and legal aspects of PT Arjuna Utama Sawit and approval from its shareholders. But the acquisition could allow the owners of the palm oil company to evade responsibility for paying the fines, said Reynaldo Sembiring, the deputy director of the Indonesian Center for Environmental Law (ICEL).
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