Adianto P. Simamora, Jakarta – Environmental activists insisted Saturday on rejecting a regulation imposing a new scheme of forest exploitation fees on non-forestry firms, despite the government's assurance it was meant to save forests.

They demanded the revocation of the regulation, saying it would only encourage more companies to exploit forests, thus further destroying them.

The activists accused the government of lying to the public when President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and Forestry Minister Malam Sambat Kaban said Friday the regulation would apply only to the 13 mining companies already licensed to operate in protected forests.

"It is not true. In fact the regulation also sets fees for companies involved in oil and gas exploration and radio, television and telecommunications networks in protected and production forests," Mining Advocacy Network (Jatam) director Siti Maiminah said.

For operating in protected forests, the regulation requires annual per-hectare payments of Rp 1.5 million, including for oil and gas exploration. In production forests the annual fee is Rp 1.2 million. According to a copy of the regulation made available to the press, for companies with open-pit mines in protected forest areas, a per-hectare fee of Rp 3 million applies.

"The regulation is legally flawed and must be withdrawn," Rino Subagyo, executive director of Indonesian Center for Environment Law (ICEL), told The Jakarta Post. "The regulation is an acknowledgement from the government that the 13 firms can operate open-pit mining in protected forests as long as they pay."

A key 1999 forestry law prohibits open-pit mining in protected forests because of the massive environmental destruction such mining can bring about. However, under a 2004 in-lieu-of-law regulation issued by the government, 13 companies received the go-ahead for open-pit operations in protected forests.

When environmental activists challenged that regulation, the Constitutional Court ruled the 1999 forestry law remained applicable to mining firms that engage in feasibility studies and exploration. The result of the court's decision, according to Rino, is that "six out of the 13 firms are not allowed to operate open-pit mines in protected forests".

The Forestry Ministry has acknowledged having issued "principal permits" to three mining companies for open-pit mining activities in protected forests.

Greenomics Indonesia agreed that the new fee-scheme regulation should be revoked. Greenomics director Elfian Effendi said it would disrupt efforts to protect the country's dwindling forests and represented an error on the part of President Yudhoyono to bring non-forestry firms into the picture.

"Allowing open-pit mining in protected forests is the biggest blunder made by the Megawati Soekarnoputri government. And imposing nominal fees for forest use in protected lands is President Yudhoyono's biggest mistake."

Elfian said the regulation would also hurt economic development in 25 regencies with protected forest areas, threatening the well-being of the seven million people there. He said he was shocked to hear the government had not conducted thorough research before setting the exploitation fees, which are considered too low.

The Forestry Ministry admitted the fee scheme was arrived at on the basis of a computer simulation.

"It shows the government had no forest management plan," said Elfian. "This is (a matter of) compromising fees between the government and businesses."

He calculated the state would bring in only around Rp 2.78 trillion per year from open-pit mining on the basis of the new fee scheme, far less than the estimated cost to the state – as much as Rp 70 trillion per year – resulting from the ecological destruction.