Yesterday, The United States of America has sign a deal with Indonesia to forgive Indonesia debt to the US ($30mil) in exchange for Sumatra forest conservation. Under this deal, Indonesia will pay the $30mil into a trust (instead of the US Government), of which the money from the trust will be used for conservation efforts.
This news come as a breath of fresh air and the idea of debt-for-nature is an innovative solution to this predicament. The Malaysian citizen has suffer on haze and the problem seams to become an annual event for so many years, one starts to wonder if we will ever get clear sky and fresh air. The Government’s attempt has been fruitless, and in fact uproot some controversies involving Malaysian companies in Indonesia. I remember at one point, the Indonesian Foreign Minister was saying why when Indonesia export fresh oxygen to Malaysia, no one appreciate nor care, but when there are some haze, everyone seams to jump on Indonesia on the issue?
This is true, Indonesia forest has been providing oxygen to the entire world, why should Indonesia bare the cost of conserving these forest? The rest of the world should pay too. And on this line of thinking, debt-for-nature seams to makes sense as the first solution to wider forest conservation. Not only Indonesia, many tropical countries has forest of their own, and why should they conserve the forest at their expense for the rest of the world, and especially the US and China who is among the top green house gas producers. One day, the air we breath may not be free anymore, and for now, it seams that the US has started to pay for it.
It was unfortunate that the Malaysian Media did not pick this up as this conservation efforts will reduce the amount of forest fires in the Island of Sumatera, and in turn reduce the haze floating over to Malaysia. I for one are looking towards a Haze Free Malaysia in years to come..
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