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Signatories of the Indonesia Palm Oil Pledge (IPOP) will disband as a result of "recent ground-breaking policy developments" in Indonesia that have fulfilled the purpose of the IPOP consortium. The signatory companies - including Cargill, Golden Agri Resources, and Wilmar International - plan to continue their sustainability commitments independently.

Indonesia and Norway have agreed on a first payment from a $1 billion deal under which Indonesia preserves its rainforests to curb carbon dioxide emissions.

Greenpeace launched an interactive web-based map that allows users to monitor deforestation and fires across Indonesia in near real time.

Palm oil shipments from Indonesia, the world's largest producer, climbed to the highest level in eight months in October as a decline in supplies of substitute oils in India and China spurred demand from the biggest buyers.

Indonesia has reported a second straight year of declining deforestation, and credited more stringent land management policies for the trend. However, the government's insistence on counting pulpwood plantations as reforested areas has once again sparked controversy over how the very concept of a forest should be defined.

A palm oil supplier to Mars, Nestlé, PepsiCo and Unilever is destroying rainforests in Papua, Indonesia, a new investigation by Greenpeace International has revealed. Satellite analysis suggests that around 4,000 hectare of rainforest were cleared in PT Megakarya Jaya Raya concession between May 2015 and April 2017-an area almost half the size of Paris.

Late last year, devastating fires engulfed 2 million hectares of land in Indonesia, impacting the health of 43 million people and emitting as much greenhouse gases into the atmosphere as Brazil does in a year. They were driven by years of rampant, unregulated deforestation, chiefly for the expansion of paper pulp and oil palm plantations. Through global supply chains, we are all connected to Indonesia's fires and to the deforestation that led to them. It's easy to say we need to stop deforestation, but this is nearly impossible without adequate information. 

The last Sumatran rhinoceros in the Malaysian wild has died, the latest grim milestone for a species on the brink of extinction. No more than 100 of the creatures are thought to remain in the forests of Indonesia, with nine more in captivity across Indonesia, Malaysia and the U.S.

Production of palm oil - the most widely used vegetable oil in the world - and a strong El Niño have converged into a perfect storm to amplify the effects of Indonesia's dry season. Indonesia produces half of the world's palm oil, which has led to illegal burning to clear land and plant African oil palm trees. Deforestation typically accounts for about 60 percent of Indonesia's total greenhouse gas emissions. 

In the midst of the second-worst year for tropical tree cover loss in 2017, Indonesia saw an encouraging sign: a 60 percent drop in tree cover loss in primary forests compared with 2016.

The Pertamina Energy Tower's curved façade is precisely calibrated for Jakarta's proximity to the equator to mitigate solar heat gain year-round.

Forest fires in Indonesia have resulted in a smoky haze that is blanketing the region and affecting neighbouring Malaysia and Singapore.

Yet another whale has suffered from plastic pollution. A sperm whale that washed up dead in a national park in Indonesia had nearly 13 pounds of plastic waste in its stomach, park officials told the Associated Press.

BASF has partnered with Cargill, Procter & Gamble and German Development Agency GIZ to build a sustainable and transparent supply chain for coconut oil in the Philippines and Indonesia. The partnership is organized under a German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) program.

A new radar and satellite system will give brands greater forest commodity sourcing transparency Companies that source commodities from areas potentially at risk of deforestation will have a new weapon in their armoury from the start of 2017. Starling is a high-resolution satellite auditing service that can be used to check forest management practices, in particular in source countries for palm oil, such as Indonesia and Malaysia.

news broke of a pending decision by the RSPO Complaints Panel to lift the suspension of IOI Group's certification under the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil certification system. If successful this move would do irreparable harm to the RSPO's credibility. Less than five months after the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) suspended Malaysian palm oil producer IOI Group's certification, that suspension has been lifted - much to the dismay of NGO campaigners. While the RSPO's Complaints Panel has said it is "satisfied that IOI has met the conditions set out in its letter to IOI," Greenpeace Indonesia and the Center for International Policy says they have yet to see any real action on the ground. This was the second time a suspension has been placed on an IOI subsidiary. A coalition of NGOs has rapidly issued an appeal, urging the RSPO to maintain its suspension of IOI Group stating that it is far too premature to lift the suspension given that the company has not come into full compliance with the RSPO Certification Systems nor resolved outstanding complaints. There are fears that any change at this stage would seriously hinder the resolution process between the complainant and the company.

Agribusiness giant Olam International has for the first time published a list of the firms it buys palm oil from, part of the company's response to allegations that it is driving forest destruction in Southeast Asia and, more dangerously, perhaps, in West Africa. Almost all of the world's palm oil comes from Indonesia and Malaysia, but as those countries run out of available land, companies like Olam are turning to Africa to expand. In defending itself against the NGOs' allegations, Olam points to the "right to develop" of nations like Gabon, where a third of people live below the poverty line and a fifth are unemployed.

Rising incomes and high demand for electric and electronic equipment (EEE) in East and South-East Asian countries have resulted in e-waste generation increasing by two thirds during 2010-2015, says a new study published by the United Nations University (UNU). The average increase in e-waste across 12 countries analysed - Cambodia, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam - was over 60 per cent during the five-year period totalling 12.3 million tonnes.

The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil has suspended its certification for Malaysian palm oil producer IOI Group amid concerns that the company has failed to live up to its obligation to tackle deforestation. The decision has already had a big impact on IOI, which has lost business with Unilever, Kellogg and Mars. "If IOI wishes to regain its customers, it must take immediate and significant action," says Greenpeace Indonesia campaigner Annisa Rahmawati.

The Rainforest Alliance will evaluate the progress of Asia Pulp and Paper's forest conservation policy and commitments, including its pledge last year to stop clearing natural forests across it supply chains in Indonesia, the company announced in its one-year report.