Indonesia disputes Guinness forest report as "slanderous"

Jakarta - Indonesia's environment minister called a Guinness World Records report 'slanderous' for marking the nation's deforestation rate as the world's highest and claimed it used obsolete data, a media report said Tuesday. The Jakarta Post reported that Indonesia has entered the Guinness Book for the second consecutive year as the nation with the highest rate of deforestation, with its forests clearing at the rate of about 52 square kilometres per day, or 300 football fields each hour. The Post cited the 2009 Guinness World Records released in September as saying the deforestation rate was 1.8 million hectares per year between 2000 and 2005. State Minister for Environment Rachmat Witoelar was quoted as calling the report slanderous and claiming it used outdated figures on Indonesia's forests. 'I am very disturbed by the report because references it used were not valid,' Witoelar was quoted as saying. He claimed the country's deforestation rate had been curbed to just 1.08 million hectares per year during the five years since 2000. Guinness based its criteria on data from groups such as global environment watchdog Greenpeace. Witoelar also said the government had taken several steps to protect forests as part of its contribution to the global reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. 'We protect our forests, many provinces and regencies have also launched a logging moratorium to protect their forests. They are also eyeing profits from REDD,' he said, referring to the reduction of emissions from forest deforestation and degradation scheme. REDD was adopted at the Bali conference on climate change December last year as a mechanism to cut greenhouse gas emissions. The Post quoted the forestry ministry's data as showing that the deforestation rate was a steady 1.8 million hectares annually between 1987 and 1997. It then spiked the rate to 2.8 million hectares per year until 2000, due mainly to severe forest fires, but the rate fell to 1.08 million hectares per year the next six years. In July, Indonesia also lodged a protest against Yale University for its environmental performance index report, which ranked it among the least environmentally friendly countries. The report, published in Newsweek's July 7-14 edition, ranked Indonesia 102nd out of 149 nations.