Malaysia claims to preserve its (peatswamp) forests and that its palm oil is 'green'. Nevertheless, the award of a 99 years concession to Sarawak Palm Oil Berhad in an unique peatswamp forest proves otherwise. Sarawak is one of the few remaining bastions of peatland ecosystems in the country, which with government permission is being systematically logged and turned into palm oil plantations.

Government

Sarawak is Malaysia’s largest state both in terms of size and also as a state with the most extensive area of rich and deep tropical peat swamp forests. The Sarawak government has initiated some conservation and protection of peat swamp forest in the past . The Maludam Peninsula, the largest single patch of peat swamp forest in Sarawak and Brunei, was gazetted in 2000 as a national park. covering 43147 hectares. The park contains the only viable population of the Borneo endemic red-banded langur (Presbytis melalophos cruciger) remaining in the world today.

Due to uncontrolled logging practices in the last few decades, the Forest Department of Sarawak in 2003 estimates that only 18,920.45ha or 1.47%, of peat swamp forests remains in primary state. This palm oil concession granted by the government for oil palm exploitation puts even more pressure on the ecosystem and renders their promise for 'green' palm oil untruthful.

Survey of Lubok Pasir Peatdome: Unique ecosystem

The Lubok Pasir peatdome close to the town of Marudi in Sarawak is of high conservation value as it represents the world's last remaining area containing two unique and endangered peat swamp forest vegetation types.

A team of experts has implemented a series of investigations in the area to survey the unique different communities of plant and tree species, two of them found only in this specific area. During the survey of 2002, most of this area was still in good state. On 23 August 2008, a team from Wetlands International Malaysia office conducted a ground truthing survey to the peat dome north west of Marudi and to the west of the Baram River as part of its project on the ‘'Status of Peatlands in Malaysia: Its relation to CO2 Emissions and Climate Change'’.

The survey found extensive logging to be ongoing and infrastructure developments moving up the to the top of the dome of this deep peat area. Several engine driven carriages transporting timber consisting mainly of Combretocarpus rotandatus (keruntum) were seen being transported out of the forest. Presently, some parts of the dome still remain intact , but the presence of logging rails on the dome suggest that these are destined to be logged in the near future.

Palm oil estate

Contrary to its conservation activities, the Sarawak government has now granted an area of over 12,000 hectares of high conservation value peat swamp forest under a 99 years concession to Sarawak Palm Oil Berhad . This concession will further speed up the process of deforestation and change the area into an oil palm plantation. The conversion to a palm oil plantation will require drainage.

This will cause high CO2 emissions from the peat, which will cancel out any possibility to make the produced palm oil environmentally sustainable. Calculations from Wetlands International indicate that use of palm oil produced on peat as a biofuel leads to 3 to 9 times higher emissions as the use of fossil fuels. The conversion of high conservation value forests conflicts with the committment of the Malaysian government of 'green' palm oil. Read more on wetlands and palm oil here.

The clearing of the peat dome is the direct result of oil palm plantations developments in the area, including the concession of 12,904 hectare to Sarawak Oil Palm Berhad. Its main shareholder is Shin Yang Palm Oil, related to the Shin Yang Group, which has logging as one of its main activities. An estate named Timbarap has been established on the dome.