Nana Rukmana, Indramayu – Illegal logging in the regency of Indramayu, West Java, has reached such alarming levels that stern police actions are needed to stop it, according to a coalit

Yemris Fointuna, Atambua – East Timorese refugees living in Atambua, East Nusa Tenggara, have destroyed some 700 hectares of protected forests in the regency of Belu for agricultural pu

Yuli Tri Suwarni, Bandung – Commission B of the West Java legislative Council, along with non-governmental organizations (NGOs), is processing a long-awaited bylaw on forest management

Jakarta – Authorities in a haze-shrouded Indonesian city will make artificial rain to wash away choking smoke from forest and ground fires, the state Antara news agency said Thursday,

Jakarta – Head of the Meteorology and Geophysics Agency (BMG) Goenawan Ibrahim warned on Thursday that the haze problem in Kalimantan might worsen as forest fires could easily be sparke

Jakarta – Indonesia's state-owned forestry company could lose its profitable "ecolabel" certificates if it does not act to stamp out illegal logging on Java island, it was revealed Wedn

Jakarta – Newly appointed Minister of Forestry M.

Teh Jen Lee – The haze caused by fires set to clear land for plantations may be less severe over South-east Asia this year because of lower palm-oil prices.

Jakarta – Smoke haze attributed to underground fires continued to choke the city of Pontianak on Indonesian Borneo Thursday, local officials said.

Jakarta – While neighboring countries have been complaining about the choking haze caused by Indonesia's forest fires and have called on Indonesia to take action to deal with the proble

G.K.

Edward Gargan, Bangsri – The last of central Java's great teakwood forests ends up in places like this, a place filled with the whine of buzz-saws and the burr of electric sanders, a pl

Jakarta – Illegal loggers are suspected of moving border posts between Indonesia and Malaysia in the rainforests of Borneo island, causing Indonesia to lose some territory, the governme

Vaudine England, Jakarta – The pillaging of the nation's forests has increased dramatically since the fall of former president Suharto and within 10 years the remaining trees will be go

Marianne Kearney, Pangkalanbun – Indonesia's new Forestry Minister, Mr Marzuki Usman, said after touring forests in Kalimantan that he was shocked by the breakneck speed at which the co

Aras Napal – The European explorers who penetrated deepest Sumatra in the 18th century recoiled in awe at the beauty of the "dark and savage" forest that covered the Indonesian island.

Palembang, South Sumatra – The provinces of South Sumatra and neighboring Jambi are urging the Ministry of Forestry and Plantations to hand over reforestation funds amounting to more th

Jakarta – Indonesia has admitted failure in meeting forestry protection commitments to its key donor group, the Consultative Group on Indonesia (CGI), weeks before a CGI meeting in Jaka

Jakarta – A regulation has been issued specifically aimed at preventing forest fires by holding more parties, including forest concession holders, accountable for fires breaking out in

Danielle Knight, Washington DC – Indonesian pulp and paper facilities, supported in the 1990s by financial institutions in Europe, Japan and North America, have caused widespread defore

Jakarta – Eighteen syndicates of illegal loggers operating from Java, Sumatra and Kalimantan cost the state an annual Rp1.2 trillion (US$125 million) in lost revenue.

Jakarta – Four local non-governmental organizations have threatened to call for a boycott by Indonesia's aid donors unless the government puts an immediate stop to illegal logging and t

George J.

Vaudine England – Near Jember, deep in East Java, is the Meru Betiri National Park, home to near-extinct panthers and one of the last great rainforests.

Jack Rieley – Southeast Asia contains seventy percent of the world's total tropical peatland, mostly in Indonesia and Malaysia.

Yogi Arief Nugraha/Hendra & BI, Pekanbaru – Illegal logging activities have continued to go on in Riau forests South Sumatra.

Bengkulu – Officials here said on Monday 48,000 of 251,000 hectares of conserved forest in the province have been damaged by illegal logging.

Jakarta – The government will take to court four regents from East Kalimantan for allegedly selling forest concessions, a senior official of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry sai

Chaidir Anwar Tanjung, Pekanbaru – Protected forests at Bukit Suligi in Kampar regency, Riau province on Sumatra's west coast, are being plundered without local authorities lifting a fi

Jakarta – An average of 1.6 million ha of Indonesia's forests are being destroyed every year, mostly by illegal loggers with powerful connections here and abroad, a report said yesterda

Arifin A/Lyndal Meehan, Jakarta – NGOs and students in the province of Jambi, Sumatra, have called on the Minister of Forestry and Plantations, Nurmahmudi Ismail, to immediately close P

Roderick Bowen, Palembang – The vegetation fires along the Riau – North Sumatra border that started on July 7 and sent smoke across the Straits of Malacca until July 20 should have been

Jakarta – They may have become an annual ritual, but Indonesia's forest fires are by no means welcome events in this country – as well as in neighbouring nations that often ended up cho

Jakarta – "I am really ashamed every time my counterparts from Malaysia and Singapore call me to complain about the haze coming from Sumatra," State Minister of Environment Sony Keraf s

Jakarta – Almost 20.1-million ha, or about half the 40-million ha of forests in Indonesia, have been damaged by fires and farming, Forestry and Plantations Minister Nur Mahmudi Ismail h

Marianne Kearney, Pekanbaru – Indonesian police, forestry employees and plantation companies are failing to fight the fires which have been burning on dozens of plantations over the las

Jakarta – More than 30 companies are under investigation for their alleged roles in the recent forest fires in Riau, a provincial administration official said on Wednesday.

Dharmastuti/SWA & LM, Jakarta – The thick palls of smoke choking North Sumatra and Riau Provinces has compelled the Ministry of Forestry and Plantations to announce that it plans to

Marianne Kearney, Jakarta – Claims by the Indonesian authorities about serious efforts being made to stem plantation fires in Sumatra are being challenged by environmentalists who say t

Jakarta – Dense haze, from forest and brush fires on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, forced the temporary closure of its most important airport yesterday, officials said.

Alex Kirby – A report by the World Resources Institute says the fires are symptomatic of "a far greater disaster – the systematic plunder and destruction of south-east Asia's greatest r

Vaudine England, Jakarta – Corruption and weak law enforcement promise to make the polluting haze caused by Indonesian forest fires a perennial problem.

C.A Tanjung/SWA & LM, Jakarta – Thick smoke blanketing Pekanbaru, the capital of Riau Province, Sumatra, since Wednesday has been attributed to land clearing activities by businesse

Maryadi/Lyndal Meehan, Jakarta – Smog in and around Pontianak, West Kalimantan, caused by slash and burn land clearing has reached hazardous levels while the local government has yet to

Jakarta – A government sweep in Tarakan, East Kalimantan last week allegedly found indications of involvement in the multi- billion dollar Borneo illegal timber trade of Malaysian milit

Singapore – Mild haze in Singapore and Malaysia could rapidly get worse, with more smoke blowing in from forest fires on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, officials said Wednesday.

Jakarta – The theft and smuggling of logs in the country is highly organized and supported by security personnel and some officials, a top government official said.

Bogor – Indonesia's forests are disappearing at a rate of 4,000 hectares a day and the government appears to be unable to do anything about it, experts said.

Jakarta – Almost half of the country's mangrove forests have disappeared since 1982, causing land abrasion by the sea and threatening biota living in that environment, activists said on

Tempo, Jakarta – The existing forest resource management system, which has been regularly exploited and abused, will be replaced by a balanced and sustainable forest management system.