[Kabar-indonesia] 2 of 3: A Study of UFS Wood Chip & Paper Pulp Mills in Kalimantan

[Joyo at aol.com]

-2 of 3-

WOOD CHIP MILLS IN OTHER COUNTRIES

Chip mills process timber - trees or parts of trees -
to produce wood chips which are then used to feed pulp
and paper mills.The industry does not practice
selective logging - it uses whatever timber it can as
the rawmaterial;almost any species will do.

Wood chip mills convert timber into small chips in a
matter of seconds. This huge wood processing capacity
can become a driving factor in the aggressive
expansion of large-scale logging operations. Such
mills can convert trees of any size into wood chips
2-5 cm long.Most parts of the tree - from the trunk
down to branches as small as 7cm in diameter - can be
turned into chips, completely destroying forests and
everything that lives in them.

Fast-growing tree species, such as pine, eucalyptus or
acacia, may be planted after natural (mixed hardwood)
forests are clear-felled.However, studies show that
95% of biodiversity is lost after conversion to timber
plantations.The flora and fauna need the diversity of
tree species found in natural forests in order to
survive, not fast-growing monocultures.

Almost all wood chip mill operations (after the
initial logging) are mechanised.So,as in the paper
pulp industry,the employment potential is low.

In some places, such as southern states in the US,
chip mills are seen as extremely harmful consumers of
natural forests which fuel deforestation. In Georgia,
for example, more than 130,000 acres of forests are
clear felled each year to feed 13 chip mills operating
in the state.

In 1998, the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League
(BREDL) asked the US Deputy President to impose a
moratorium on 18 chip mills in North Carolina,which
were using 4.5 million tonnes of wood and destroying
123,000 acres of forest every year. In 2000, the
people of Tennessee in the southern US also demanded a
chip mill moratorium; in their state there were 156,
consuming 1.2 million acres of forest per year.

In Australia and the Philippines, some 5 million m³ of
forest timber is being converted to wood chips
annually, mainly for export to Japan.

Greenpeace is actively campaigning against wood chip
mills in Tasmania, where large-scale logging to feed
chip mills is clearing old growth forests.

Tropical hardwood chips sell for US$120- 130/tonne on
the world market and there are plenty of buyers in the
paper pulp sector.

The impact of the chip mill industry is not limited to
the destruction of forests or the livelihoods of
communities living in and around forests. For people
living near such mills there are other negative
aspects, such as noise and dust pollution, the dangers
of large trucks using village roads to access the
mills, the devaluation of land and property and
reduced water quality.

Sources: Note:1 acre = 0.4047 hectares          
Tribune Online News Story,21 May 2000
Practitioner,November 1997 BREDL,5Agustus 1998
DogwoodAlliance tasmaniantimes.com,28 June 2005 7

News of the plans to set up a paper pulp mill in South
Kalimantan spread after the provincial governor for
2000 - 2005, Sjachriel Darham, returned from a trip to
Expo 2000, in Hannover, Germany.

The governor used that opportunity to get investment
commitments totalling US$3,340 million.

The largest (US$1,200 million) was for PT MBBM to set
up a pulp mill with a production capacity of 600,000
tonnes per year in the districts of Kotabaru and Tanah
Laut. Local newspapers reported that a consortium of
companies from eight different countries was behind
the deal - the Netherlands,Austria, Finland, France,
Sweden, US,China and Singapore.

Work on the pulp mill was initially scheduled to begin
in mid 2003 but, due to delays issuing the necessary
permits, it was 14 August 2003 when the governor of
South Kalimantan officially endorsed the 29 project.
Local authorities and embassy delegates from the other
countries involved witnessed the announcement at a
celebration of the province's establishment . However
there are no signs yet of a paper pulp mill on the
ground.

The main problem for PT MBBM's operations has been the
dispute between PT HRB and the forestry department
over withdrawal of its HTI permit. PT MBBM could do
little faced with uncertainties over the legality of
what was supposed to be its main feeder plantation.
Moreover, the Indonesian government requires companies
who plan to set up pulp mills to establish their own
plantations .

30 31 C FORESTS IN DANGER 29 30 31 Radar Banjar, 20
December 2002 Radar Banjar, 15 August 2003
AgroIndonesia.com, 25 July 2005

----------

Lack of certainty about permits and supplies has not
affected the PT Mangium Anugerah Lestari (PT MAL) wood
chip mill. At present,the only official permit that PT
MAL possesses is from the local administrator - the of
Kotabaru district. Entitled "Permit Extension for the
Land needed to set up an integrated Chip Mill and
Port" (No.14/P/2004), this decree covers 88.216 ha in
the villages ofAlle-Alle andTanjung Seloka in the
south of Pulau Laut .

In theory, the PT MAL wood chip mill will be supplied
with timber from three local HTI concessions: PT
HRB,PT Inhutani II and PT Inhutani III.In practice
this is unrealistic. PT HRB does not have sufficient
acacia ready to harvest, and PT Inhutani II and III
currently supply timber to the Kiani Kertas pulp plant
in East Kalimantan (see Appendix 3).

In addition,PT HRB's concession area has been
significantly reduced by overlap with concessions
granted to other companies. In addition, the Kintap,
Sebamban and Satui blocks are not suitable for
plantation development because they contain
settlements.

Meanwhile, local authorities prefer to prioritise land
use permits for oil palm plantations, which they
believe will generate profits faster than timber
plantations.Where concession permits overlap, existing
pulpwood plantations may only remain until harvested.
After clearing, the land will be taken over by oil
palm plantation companies which have been granted
permits ( ). The area between Kintap and Sungai bupati
HGU 32 Danau has already been converted to oil palm
plantations.

Unofficial local initiatives further reduce the
effective area of the PT HRB plantation. During a
joint field trip, Walhi South Kalimantan and Global
2000 (Friends of the Earth Austria) were told that the
head of Sebamban village had reclaimed land previously
rented to PT HRB for its plantation and allowed
villagers to fell the acacia trees if they needed
timber to build houses.

PT HRB's concession area overlaps with eleven oil palm
plantations concessions, a coal mine owned by
PTArutmin and sites used unofficially by local people
for mining ( ).The oil palm plantations are operated
by the following companies: PT Damit Mitra Sekawan and
PT PKIS in Jorong; PT Pola Kahuripan Inti Sawit (PKIS)
and PT SMART in Kintap; PT Damit Mitra Sekawan and PT
SMART in Satui, PT Sayang Elang and PT Rumpun
SuburAbadi in Sebamban (both subsidiaries of the same
Malaysian group), PT Alam Raya Kencana Mas in Pamukan,
PT Singalen in Teluk Kepayan, and PT Gawi Makmur
Kalimantan (GMK) in Sekapuk.

PT HRB and PTArutmin reached an agreement over their
overlapping concession areas some time ago.

They agreed that PTArutminwould only mine where PT HRB
had yet to plant trees or in plots with trees at least
five years old.Although wood is usually harvested
after peti

32 PT Mangium Anugerah Lestari, May 2005

 six years, PT HRB was prepared to harvest plots
overlapping with the mining concession sooner. If PT
Arutmin mines areas planted with trees under five
years old,it has to pay PT HRB compensation .

PT Arutmin is currently mining such areas within PT
HRB's concession - having given the company one year's
notice of its plans. However, PT HRB was unable to
harvest the wood while awaiting the outcome of its
litigation against the forestry minister.

Forestry consultants, Jaakko Pöyry, have been highly
optimistic about the supplies of pulpwood from PT HRB
(see Table 4). Its own figures show that, of the 33
295,000 ha concession, the total area UFS can exploit
is 93,566 ha at most due to overlapping concessions
and encroachment. Even the 75,758.43 ha cited in
MBBM's environmental impact assessment report ( ) is a
huge over-estimate. By 2005, UFS stated that "an
independent review of the plantation area showed a
decline ….to 46,000 ha" . Currrently, there may be as
34 35 AMDAL HutanTanaman Industri, HTI BPPN DR
Indonesia is one of the world's lowest cost producers
of paper pulp.However, its pulp and paper industry
runs on a huge financial and ecological debt.

Industrial wood plantations ( ), intended to supply
the pulp mills, are part of this story of
unstainability.

Indonesia's deforestation rate has averaged 2.8
million hectares per year since 1996.The pulp and
paper industry has been a major cause of forest
destruction.In 2000,pulp production required 23-25
million m of wood, while timber plantations could only
supply 3.8 million m . So, 85% of the timber demand
for the pulp industry was met by clearing natural
forests. Much of this forest was in areas zoned for
conversion into HTI concessions.

Although clearly responsible for forest
destruction,the pulp industry has been supported by
the Indonesian government with credit, licences and
other forms of assistance. For example, Indonesian
pulp and paper producers had debts amounting to US$17
billion in foreign currency after the 1997 financial
crash, but no major company was forced to close. The
Indonesian Bank Restructuring Agency ( ) allowed the
same managements to continue.

Despite this, president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono wants
the Reforestation Fund ( ) - a levy collected from
logging companies - to finance a new drive to develop
HTI plantations.

The government has set an initial target to develop 5
million hectares of HTI plantations by 2009. It will
also speed up licensing and relax 3 3 regulations
considered to hamper the process, then invite
investors to develop HTI plantations in Indonesia.

This is not the first time that HTI companies have
benefited from the Reforestation Fund as a form of
development assistance.

Presidential Decree No.29/1990 extended an earlier
decree on the Reforestation Fund (No. 32/1998) which
initially allocated soft loans for reforesting
logged-over forest areas. The new decree allowed the
Fund to be used for HTI projects.

Many Reforestation Fund loans to HTI companies became
bad debts which are still outstanding. In 2004, the
forestry department rescheduled Reforestation Fund
loans for HTI projects; 14 HTI companies closed
because they could not pay up.

It is extraordinary that such an environmentally
destructive industry, which has led to financial
losses contributing to Indonesia's poverty,still
benefits from funding support and other advantages in
the name of generating state revenues and reducing
poverty.

Sources: FWI/GFW,2001 Human RightsWatch,January 2003
DTE Newsletter 48,February 2001 IWGFF,2004 Forestry
Department Press Release No:S.453/II/PIK-1/2004
TempoInteraktif.com, 13April 2005 Kompas,16 June 2005
AgroIndonesia.com,21 June 2005
http://www.depkominfo.go.id,23 Mei 2006               
   33 34 35 Personal communication by secured source
Jaakko Pöyry, 2004 UFS,Annual Report 2005, p66

little as 15,000 ha of PT HRB's concession with timber
plantation in good condition .

It has been common practice in Indonesia for companies
to apply for HTI concessions simply to exploit any
commercially valuable natural forest within the area.
A World Bank report predicts that Kalimantan's lowland
forests will be commercially logged out by 2010 .

Since 1999, few HTI concessionaires in South
Kalimantan have carried out any replanting. The
companies say this is due to their shortage of capital
and lack of access to loans from the Reforestation
Fund.The only exception is state-owned company, PT
Inhutani II, which is currently replanting its logged
over areas with acacia.

This situation presents a number of problems - not
least, a serious shortage of acacia and other
fastwoods from local plantations in the coming decade.

So companies and communities will depend on felling
natural forest to meet their timber needs.

The social and environmental costs of forest
destruction, including loss of biodiversity, are
high.Areas of natural forest or HTI which have been
clear felled and left without replanting are
vulnerable to soil erosion, especially in hilly
regions, and quickly invaded by coarse grass ( ).The
Indonesian government calls the result 'critical
land'. Local entrepreneurs may claim the land for
speculation or - particularly in South Kalimantan -
coal mining,while indigenous communities may reclaim
ancestral lands for agriculture: both leading to
conflicts with plantation companies.

Until UFS' timber supply problem is resolved by the
increased availability of acacia from HTI plantations,
it is likely that its companies will have to depend on
destructive logging, illegal logging or both.

Most obviously at risk are the 73,000 ha of forest
within PT HRB's plantation concession and an unknown
amount of forest on Pulau Laut. Jaakko Pöyry mentions
36 37 alang-alang some 40,000 ha of forest in the
north of Pulau Laut ,but satellite images and field
reports show no firm evidence of this (see Map 3).

Moreover, UFS has discussed plans for new access roads
in South Kalimantan (whether for the HTI concession,
pulp mill or chip mill is not known).

Wherever new roads are built through forests, forest
destruction increases as they provide access to
illegal loggers and farmers.

The threat that PT MAL's demand for timber poses to
the forests of South Kalimantan is illustrated by the
following figures and Table 5.

38 39 Between 4.5 and 5.4 m³ of logs are needed to
produce one tonne of pulp for paper production .The
figures are similar for chip mills.So,the PT MAL chip
mill will need at least 3.15 million m of logs each
year to meet its 700,000 tonne capacity.

The average yield of Indonesian HTI estates is 125 -
150 m³ per hectare over a 6-8 year cycle .

According to Jaakko Pöyry's research for UFS, PT HRB
could achieve overall yields of 130 m³ timber per
hectare on parts of its plantations where the acacia
is over 11 years old.Allowing for 10% losses, these
would deliver 117 m /ha at the mill and would last for
the first five years of operations .

In fact, the actual planted area of PT HRB's
concession is only 46,000 ha . Even if all this area
had been planted with acacia 11 years ago and it were
in

40 3 41 3 42 43 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 LSM Rindang
Banua, pers com Holmes,D.,World Bank, 2000 Jaakko
Pöyry, 2005 Jaakko Pöyry, October 2005 Ibid, FWI/GFW,
2001 IWGFF, 2004 Jaakko Pöyry, 2004, op cit UFS,Annual
Report 2005,

prime condition, it would not produce sufficient
timber to run the chip mill for 2 years at full
capacity or for 3 years production at 70% capacity.

On average, the productivity of acacia on HTI estates
in Kalimantan is 15 m /ha/y. So for trees harvested at
7 years after planting, the total yield/ha is 105 m
which, given losses during felling or transport
(roughly 10%), translates as 95 m /ha. Allowing for
harvesting,improving the soil and replanting,this
gives an 8 year cycle for awell-managed plantation.

3 3 3 Volume 1 ha planted estate (11 year old
acacia):117m 46,000 ha planted estate clear felled:
5,382,000m Volume 1 tonne timber: 5m Total amount
ofwood chips: 1,307,400 3 3 3 As the following
calculation shows, the area of plantation required to
supply the chip mill is far greater than PT HRB's
total concession area of 259,000 ha.

Volume 1 ha planted estate :95m Volume 1 tonne timber
:50m Area required to produce 1 tonne :19 ha
Production capacity : 700,000 t/year or :3500000m
/year Area required per cycle :36,842.11 ha/year
Harvesting cycle :8 years Total estate area required
:294,736.84 ha Jaakko Poyry reckons that, with
improved varieties of acacia and better management
techniques, annual growth increments of 25 m /ha, are
possible for the HRB concession in the future .Even
using this highly optimistic figure (which far exceeds
any achieved to date in the area) and a more rapid
harvesting cycle of 7 years, a similar calculation
shows that more that 155,000 ha of HTI plantation
would be needed for the wood chip mill to run at
capacity.

Yet PT HRB's total plantable area is only 93,566 ha -
unless it clears the forest remaining in its
concession.

Moreover, if it is true that that the area of
well-managed timber plantation in PT HRB's concession
is as low as 15,000 ha, there is obviously a
substantial potential deficit .

So where might the rest of the timber for the wood
chip mill come from? There are two likely scenarios.
The first is based on field evidence that PT Inhutani
II is the only concession holder currently replanting
its estate. The second draws on data in PT MBBM's
environmental impact assessment report ( ) on local
supply capacity.

3 . 3 , , 3 3 44 45 AMDAL Scenario 1 Scenario 2 - PT
HRB :15,000 ha - 43,320 ha - PT HRB :15,000 ha - PT
Kirana Khatulistiwa : 4,100 ha - PT Inhutani II
:37,450 ha - 76,750 ha As at least 155,000 ha are
needed on a 7-year cycle, the shortfall for Scenario 1
is: 111,680 ha and for Scenario 2 is:70,634.62 ha.The
equivalent more realistic figures for the 8-year cycle
above are: 251,417 ha and 217,987 ha.Yet there is only
an estimated 129,362 ha of acacia in South Kalimantan
,outside PT HRB's 49,000 ha plantation (see Appendix
3). In other words, there are not sufficient HTI
plantations for the chip mill to run at near
capacity.This can only mean that the raw material will
be 'supplied' by the natural forests of South
Kalimantan and further afield.

UFS should explain how these figures are compatible
with its statement that all its mills will exclusively
use plantation wood and that high conservation forest
will be spared .

Unless UFS operates very strict controls, timber from
unknown outside sources may enter its chip or pulp
mills. So PT MAL and PT MBBM could - knowingly or
unknowingly - benefit from the results of illegal
logging. The issue is not just illegal logging, but
destructive logging.Nowthe court case has been settled
in favour of PT HRB's licence, the company can legally
clear natural forest in its own concession. Inhutani
II already has permits to turn forest on Pulau Laut
into HTI plantations.

Last year, UFS signed a contract with PT Inhutani II
for 1 million tonnes of timber over three years , but
this is not enough to keep Kiani Kertas in full
production for 6 months.It is not clear which other
local HTI concessions PT MAL plans to draw on for
supplies of raw timber in addition to PT HRB. No other
agreements seem to have been signed. If PT Inhutani II
PT Inhutani II :28,320 ha + PT Inhutani III :20,200 ha
+ 46 47 48 44 45 46 47 48 Jaakko Pöyry, 2004 LSM
Rindang Banua, pers com Jaakko Pöyry, 2005 UFS,Annual
Report 2005 Sinar Harapan, 8 August 2005

and Inhutani III sell their logs to pulp mills in Riau
or East Kalimantan, or decide to protect some of the
natural forest in their concessions, then the South
Kalimantan wood chip mill faces yet more serious
problems in obtaining sustainable supplies.

Forestry Department data showed that, as of November
2005, not one final decree ( ) had been issued
allowing a HTI to be set up for pulp production in
South Kalimantan .Despite this,UFS and its consultants
still insist that its wood chip mill will be supplied
only from sustainable sources rather than mature
tropical forests.

As UFS is planning to build the PT MBBM pulp mill at
Satui and is currently operating - and hopes to buy -
the PT Kiani Kertas pulp mill in East Kalimantan, it
is logical to expect that the wood chips produced at
its SKD 49 Alle-Alle plant will be supplying these.
However, this is now in doubt. UFS signed a purchasing
agreement with CMEC (China National Machinery and
Equipment Import and Export Corporation) in May
2005.CMEC - currently building the chip mill on a
'turnkey' arrangement - will buy 90% of the chip mill
production and have an option on the other 10% .
Neither UFS' press release or its 2005 Annual Report
gives any information about how long this agreement is
to last.

Unless UFS buys the wood chips back from CMEC (which
seems uneconomic), this means that both Kiani Kertas
and the proposed Satui pulp mill will have no source
of raw material from HRB,because nearly all the timber
going into the chip mill from UFS' plantation - and
others such as Inhutani II - will be exported,
probably to China.

If the provincial authorities keep pushing for the
establishment of the chip and paper mills in South
Kalimantan, this will inevitably pose a severe threat
to forest-dependent people in the province, especially
the Meratus Dayak. A precedent was set back in 1999
when 46,000 ha of the Meratus mountains was
reclassified specifically to give the Korean logging
company PT KodecoTimber access to commercially
valuable timber in return for giving up a concession
area near the coast . 51 Apart from being the basis of
the livelihoods of the indigenous Meratus Dayak, the
forests covering the Meratus mountain range act as a
water catchment system for the provinces of South and
Central Kalimantan.As much of southern Borneo is at or
below sea level, stripping the hillsides of forest can
bring disastrous floods to the low lands where most of
the population lives and farms. It is these forests
that are nowunder threat (see Appendix 2).

51 DTE Newsletter 50:7, August 2001

50 The Meratus Mountains cover nine districts of South
Kalimantan: Kotabaru, Tanah Bumbu,Tanah Laut,
Banjar,Tapin, Hulu Sungai Selatan, Hulu SungaiTengah,
Hulu Sungai Utara and Balangan.

There are around 300 in this forested region - the
ancestral home of the Meratus Dayak people.

The forest is essential to them; it forms the basis of
their lives and is an integral part of their culture
and religious beliefs.

The forests of the Meratus Mountains

contain some giant, ancient trees and act as a water
catchment area for South and Central Kalimantan
provinces. When the logging industry took off in South
Kalimantan, many of the largest specimens of meranti
and ramin were felled to supply wood processing mills.
People were given chainsaws to cut down their own
trees.As a result, big trees - which harboured wild
bees whose honey was collected at certain times of the
year - became scarce in Meratus.

Moreover,the trees needed to build and houses became
increasingly hard to find.

The indigenous community split into two camps: one
wanted to follow traditional knowledge systems to
maintain the forest as a sustainable resource;the
other believed they may as well benefit from the theft
of their forest, if it was being destroyed anyway.

During several meetings with Meratus Dayak communities
in the of Limbur Lokasi, Libaru Baras and Gadang in
Kotabaru district during 2004, people in this second
group explained why they had participated in the
destruction of their forests.They preferred to get
some financial return, rather than just standing by
while others profited from their timber. Reversing the
old Indonesian proverb "Put up with tough times now to
enjoy the benefits later", their philosophy was "Live
now, pay later". If disaster followed, they would
think about howto deal with it then.

However, local people get very little financial return
for felling the forests. Usually, they are only
employed to cut down trees, selling the timber to
traders for Rp250,000 - 300,000 per m .

Transport costs and petrol for the chainsaw are
deducted from this, so each person only earns Rp60,000
- 100,000 (US$6-10) for a week's work.

The logs are then taken to a wood processing mill
elsewhere in the province.

Despite high levels of 'illegal logging' in South
Kalimantan, only 145 cases were recorded by the South
Kalimantan police in 2003. Most stolen timber is or ,
which has a higher commercial value than otherwood
species.

3 meranti ulin Sources: South Kalimantan police,2003
Field visit notes, Limbur,2002-2004 Note:A is a small
community unit within Meratus Dayak. It also means the
community hall used for gatherings and/or living.

49 50 Bina Produksi Kehutanan, via FWI,April 2006 UFS
website, press release, 28 April 2005

------------

D MINIMALTRANSPARENCY

>From the very start, UFS' policy has been to withhold
crucial information about its operations in South
Kalimantan - a lack of transparency supported by the
provincial authorities.Yet people are entitled to
information about plans to convert or exploit forest
resources under Indonesian law.NGOs have had to rely
on the media for information on the company's
operations and its partners. Neither UFS nor the local
authorities have undertaken steps to seek the
free,prior informed consent of indigenous communities
likely to be affected by the project, as required by
international law.

All large new developments in Indonesia with likely
environmental and social impacts have a statutory
obligation to carry out an Environmental Impact
Assessment (EIA/ ). No work should start until this
report has had a public hearing and been approved by
Jakarta and the local authorities.It is not known when
or where the public meetings were held to discuss the
AMDAL EIA for UFS' Satui pulp mill or its chip mill on
Pulau Laut.

Local CSOs were not invited and have not been able to
obtain copies of the relevant documents for PT MAL.

Furthermore, there is no information on UFS' website
about the EIAs, management plans or the permits needed
to establish and operate the pulp or chip mills.

UFS told Jaakko Pöyry in 2005 that an ' ' had been
done for the wood supply for the chip mill .

There are several odd features about this claim.
Firstly, the term is an Indonesian term for an
environmental impact assessment but,under Indonesian
law, only new developments require this.So the PT MAL
chip mill and port need an /EIA, but not the PT HRB
feeder concession.Secondly,this document has not been
made public to the Indonesia authorities and Jaakko
Pöyry only received a summary.

It therefore seems likely that this study of the PT
HRB concession was commissioned by UFS in an effort to
get approval for its projects from MIGA, the World
Bank's insurance agency. MIGA and UFS have been
consulting over the last six months and MIGA is
reported to have said that it "believed that the
project had the potential to be a model of plantation
operation in an environmentally sustainable manner."
The provincial authorities only started to adopt a
more open attitude after the Indonesian Human Rights
Commission ( ) took the initiative to organise a
series of parallel meetings with representatives of
the provincial government, investors, local people and
localNGOsin 2003.

's Sub-Commission for Mediation carried out a
preparatory meeting on 10 February 2003.

This consultation was attended by local officials -
including South Kalimantan's governor and the head of
the provincial forestry service - members of the
regional assembly, academics, company representatives,
NGOs and local communities.

Such mediation was much needed because a series of
problems over the control and management of South
Kalimantan's forests and other natural resources had
been reported to since early 2001.

Most conflicts revolved around plans to change the
zoning of protection forest in the Meratus mountains
so the area could be opened up to PT Kodeco Timber's
logging, PT Placer Dome's gold mining and paper pulp
mills.

-end/2 of 3... continues...

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