Copenhagen: Outcome As Predicted
The recently concluded Copenhagen climate summit was viewed by many participants as a failure for its inability to yield sizable reductions in carbon emissions. But for those concerned with the welfare of the world’s poor, particularly many of those living in tropical climates, the summit’s failure was in fact its greatest triumph. An effort by...
What Deforestation?
Many harsh critiques of the Malaysian oil palm industry do not know that Malaysia had stopped deforesting its pristine natural tropical forests 15 years ago when the country pledged at the Rio Earth Summit to maintain a minimum of 50% of its land area under permanent forests. The policy behind the pledge remains...
De-linking NGOs Concerns Over Deforestation and Palm Oil
1. A few years ago when oils and fats were cheaper than petroleum, the EU and USA rushed to promote the use of biofuels for various reasons. One not-so-frankly-revealed reason was that oilseed farmers will benefit from the new market outlets and the increase in prices. The governments also benefited from this strategy because agricultural...
How Much Agricultural Development is Right for a Sustainable Future of a Country
Current debate by some NGOs is tending to link agricultural activities with deforestation. To have a healthy debate, there must be some definitions. For example, what percentage of our country's land area is allowed for agriculture, and what percentage should be conserved as forests. Would this percentage be uniform as an international benchmark, or should...
Carbon Debts
Current debate on sustainability and global warming relates to green house gases emissions. Those experts with vested interest to potray negatively on targeted industries are devising and manupulating various formulae and asssumptions to potray undesirable carbon emmission figures for their targeted industry while carefully ajusting to ensure their national industries competing in the related industries...
Question of Sustainability
Those involved in the palm oil industry like to have information to counter negative allegations linking oil palm cultivation to potential deforestation. Those in the middle of the debate want to know more of the true situation in order to form their own opinion. Those NGOs and their followers bent on opposing the growth of...
