Toying with Indonesia’s Deforestation
Andrew Wirawan
Introduction to Environmental Studies
April 2014
Introduction
Indonesia is one of the world’s most forested countries with a wide
variety of forest types. These forests are rich in biodiversity and unsurprisingly
are an important livelihood source for a great number of people. Somewhere
between 6 million and 30 million Indonesians are estimated to be directly
dependent on forests (Sunderlin et al. 2000). As Indonesia is a developing
country, the government is highly dependent on the forestry sector, as well as
forestry-related sectors such as agriculture, estate crops, mining and logging.
Consequently, during Indonesia’s history, its forests have been continually
exploited, meaning deforestation and forest degradation have been inevitable.
This paper will emphasize on deforestation caused by various world
famous toy manufacturers, such as Mattel, Disney, Hasbro and Lego. The usage of
MTH (Mixed Tropical Hardwood) in their packaging means rainforest clearance
in Indonesia, since MTH is only pulped at commercial scales in Indonesia, mainly
by APP (Asia Pulp & Paper). Not only deforestation is caused, but this
deforestation is also pushing critically endangered wildlife like Sumatran tigers
toward extinction and making climate change worse.
The Producer: APP
APP or Asia Pulp & Paper is one of the largest pulp and paper companies
in the world. APP has its roots since the 1970s, and with the founder’s close
relation to Indonesia’s former president Soeharto, APP’s access to be the pioneer
in Indonesia’s pulping industry was very promising. Now, with 14 major
companies in Indonesia and China, APP has a current annual combined pulp,
paper, and packaging-grade capacity of more than 18 million tons per year, and
market its products to more than 120 countries across six continents1.
Over the years, APP has received various environmental criticisms from
several environmental protection organizations. According to Friends of the
Earth, APP has cleared over 280,000 hectares of rainforest in the past decade,
1 http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-02-05/asia-pulp-and-paper-halts-clearing-in-
indonesian-natural-forests.html
2Toying with Indonesia’s Deforestation 麦麦麦 11300136058 麦麦麦
and plans to cut another 300,000 over the next five years2. The company has
been at the center of many environmental controversies and has been accused of
being involved in illegal logging in Cambodia and Indonesia, and has breached
agreements with three major environmental organizations. The company is also
well known for defaulting on debt repayments in 2001, during a period of wide-
scale financial problems in the South East Asia region. APP’s track on illegal
logging was also found in Yunnan Province in China in 2005, where 24,700 cubic
meters of timber were logged without government approval in the project,
turning 1.8 million hectares into a real wasteland3.
Indonesia is the only large-scale producer of either MTH or acacia pulp
used in various toy packaging of Mattel, Hasbro, Disney and Lego. Within
Indonesia, there are only two-large scale producers of pulp using MTH, which are
APP and APRIL. But, APP is the predominant producer of any packaging material
with MTH content. APP sources mixed tropical hardwoods (MTH) to produce
high-quality virgin pulp for use in copy paper, tissue paper, packaging and glossy
print materials to pursue its’ brand of ‘The Provider of High-Quality Paper
