Between 2000 and 2019, Indonesia lost more forest to mining than any other tropical country, with coal extraction the main driver, the first ever biome-wide assessment has found.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The study<\/a>, by researchers from Vienna University of Economics and Business, shows that the country lost 1,901 square kilometres of tree cover as a direct result of industrial mining activities in two decades. Among the 26 countries investigated, this accounted for 58.2% of direct forest loss by mining, making Indonesia the most affected by far.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Across its islands, Indonesia has the third-largest area of primary rainforest in the world. Coal has long been the most extracted mineral there, besides bauxite, nickel and gold, according to official data<\/a>. In 2021, the country produced 610 million tons<\/a> of coal, half of which was exported, at a value of US$29.6 billion. The main destination<\/a> for this coal was China, with 99.2 million tons shipped there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cCoal extraction in Indonesia is done with open-pit mining, hence the deforestation,\u201d says Syahrul Fitra, a senior forest campaigner at Greenpeace Southeast Asia. Open-pit mining extracts minerals from the earth by removing soil and rocks from above the deposits. Syahrul says the process of clearing forests and creating holes dramatically changes the landscape.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, in 2019 \u201conly\u201d 1,154 sq km of land was deforested in Indonesia as a result of human activities, the lowest in two decades and a 75% decrease<\/a> from 2018, which saw 4,624 sq km of loss.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAlthough Indonesia\u2019s total deforestation has declined annually since 2015, these findings emphasise the continued need for strong land use planning to ensure mining does not destroy forests or violate community rights,\u201d says Hariadi Kartodihardjo, professor of forest policy at Bogor Agricultural University, West Java.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He argues that the government should stop issuing mining licences in protected forest or conservation areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt is important to note that once a mining permit is issued in a forested area, there must be deforestation, but the problem is that current mining regulations in Indonesia still allow such a thing to happen. Thus it is necessary to assess this regulation,\u201d Hariadi says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The peer-reviewed study, published last September in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States, used data from 26 countries representing 76.7% of total tropical deforestation between 2000 and 2019. The researchers took the coordinates of active industrial mines and compared them to forest loss over the same time period, using data contained in the global forest change dataset<\/a>, which is maintained by the University of Maryland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cInvestigated mining areas covered 11,467 square kilometres of land that included 7,019 sq km of tropical forest in 2000. By 2019, 3,264 sq km, or 46.5%) of these forest areas were directly lost to industrial mine expansion,\u201d the report says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So far, mining is a minor driver compared to other causes of tropical deforestation, such as crop production or livestock farming. However, \u201cits growing importance has been emphasised in various case studies in the Amazon region,\u201d the report states.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The study shows that a similar trend has occurred in other assessed countries, notably Brazil, which accounted for 10%, or 327 sq km, of forest lost to mining since 2000, followed by Ghana (213 sq km, 6.5%), Suriname (203 sq km, 6.2%), and Cote d\u2019Ivoire (99 sq km, 3%). Together with Indonesia, these countries contributed 84% of the observed deforestation directly caused by mining, while the remaining countries accounted for 16%.<\/p>\n\n\n\nForests lost to mining expansion<\/h2>\n\n\n\n