Nature Alert: EU’s biodiesel tax move raises concern

Thursday 26 February 2009

EU’s biodiesel tax move raises concern

Thursday February 26, 2009 The Star, Malaysia

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia and Indonesia expressed concern over a plan by the European Union (EU) to impose import taxes on US biodiesel, potentially damping the outlook for alternative fuels made from vegetable oils and grains.

Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Datuk Seri Peter Chin said yesterday he had written to Germany on the matter. Half of Europe’s biodiesel is produced and consumed in Germany.

The EU also requires a company to be certified as producing palm oil, which can be used as an alternative fuel, in a sustainable manner before the commodity can be shipped and used in the 27-member bloc.

Palm oil has halved in value from a year earlier as the global recession curbed consumption amid record output and stockpiles while slumping crude oil prices eroded demand for biofuels.

These restrictive policies had created an unlevel playing field and depressed the prices of palm oil compared to soybean and rapeseed oil, Chin and Indonesia’s Agriculture Minister Anton Apriyantono told reporters. — Bloomberg

Indonesia and Malaysia, the world’s two biggest producers of palm oil, teamed up in November to reduce output of the edible oil after prices slumped.

The two countries agreed to replant old estates, cutting annual production by as much as 800,000 tonnes.

Chin expects Malaysia’s palm oil production this year to be static or lower, than last year’s 17.5 million tonnes, while Apriyantono reiterated an earlier target of 19 million tonnes.

http://biz.thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2009/2/26/business/3351267&sec=business

Hall of Shame for President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and the Palm Oil Industry.

Nothing can prepare one for the sight of the systematic extermination of orangutans by the government of Indonesia.

Look at the photos and news articles on these pages in the context of a statement the President made to the media on 10th December 2007.

“In the last 35 years about 50,000 orangutans are estimated to have been lost as their habitats shrank. If this continues, this majestic creature will likely face extinction by 2050,” President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said at the launch of an orangutan conservation plan at the climate talks in Bali.

“The fate of the orangutan is a subject that goes to the heart of sustainable forests … To save the orangutan we have to save the forest.”

Statements like these are most welcome, but unless backed up by action, such words fall on deaf ears within the Ministry of Forestry....who are busy granting licences to cut down the very forests the President says they should protect!

When you think you are to busy to help, please could you reflect for a moment on .........

The following extract refers to environmental problems in general. I just hope you find it as thought provoking and relevant to orangutans as I have.

"This is such a shocking and unpalatable fact that most people deny it, or they just don't want to think about it. They believe as individuals, they can do little about it, so push it to the back of their minds. But I can't do that.

When something has to be done, we need to do it. It doesn't matter how big the challenge is or how hard the solution; if I know something is wrong, and I am in a position to help, I will do my best to make it right." Duncan Bannatyne, successful British businessman.