Oil Palm Plantation Boom in Indonesia

by Chieh-Hsin Chen

The anticipated depletion of fossil fuel has caused the production of alternative fuel sources to become an extremely important field of industry. Many less developed countries in South East Asia promote mass production of biofuel crops as a primary export. Palm oil, used in cooking as well as biofuel, is one of the main exports from Indonesia. The high demand of palm oil has led to a rapid increase of oil palm plantations, leading also to massive deforestation. Riau Province is one of the largest oil palm producing regions. From 1990s to 2012, there has been a significant decrease of forest in the region due to the boom of oil palm plantations. Ramdani and Hino (2013) analyze satellite imagery and greenhouse gas emissions from different time periods to determine the scale of deforestation. The results show that in the Riau Province, the oil palm industry rapidly increased from 1990 to 2000, with transformation of tropical forest and peat land as the primary source of emissions. Continue reading