For Your Information: Reducing Transnational Pollution (UNEP Topic A)
Here's an article on UNEP's Topic A: Reducing Transnational Pollution
Last year,
haze due to Indonesian forest fires caused hundreds of schools in parts of
Malaysia - Malacca, Selangor and Kuala Lumpur - to shut down, and emergency
status for two towns in Johor to be declared. Evidently, such air pollution has
the potential to cause detrimental effects that cannot be contained to the
source country. Indonesian small-scale farmers and large plantations started
this haze as they used burning as a cheap, fast way to clear the land space
while enriching the soil. However, the benefits of this method are far
outweighed by the harms.
2013’s Southeast
Asian Haze was not the first time a choking haze has engulfed parts of
Indonesia, Malaysia, and even Singapore. Malaysia’s record-breaking worst air
pollution dates back to 1996, with Singapore also badly affected. Such severe haze is not only detrimental to
the health of the people; it also has high economic costs. The estimated
mean loss to Indonesia due to the 1997 haze was US$9290 million, and even its
distant neighbor Singapore was estimated to have suffered a loss of US$225
million, due to interruptions to tourism, transport networks, health, education
and work. Despite the obvious and severe economic, health and political impacts,
these fires have continued to be a regular occurrence, and are even increasing
in severity.
In light of
the severe repercussions to the society due to the haze, Indonesia and her
affected neighbors have taken measures towards combating this serious problem.
Indonesia has adopted the zero burning policy under the Forestry Act, and many
countries have also entered collaborations with Indonesia in order to help
mitigate the problems of forest burning. Clearly though, these measures are not
working. The rampant forest fires occurring despite this zero burning policy illustrates
that law enforcement is clearly lacking.
International collaborations - such as the Singapore-Jambi
collaboration - have also been criticized for their lack of financial and
manpower sustainability. This
collaboration is an agreement between Singapore and the Jambi Province in
Indonesia that was set up in 2007 to develop together mitigation and prevention
measures for these forest fires. Singapore invested SG$1 million over two years
to install air quality and weather monitoring stations, and to provide training
on preventing and suppressing fires.
This
collaboration has failed however, due to the lack of know-how and money to
continue the operation of the weather monitoring stations, which is not
surprising considering the short term of the project. This highlights a major problem with
international solutions for transnational pollution, which is the lack of
motivation or incentive for any country to take active steps towards combating
it, as other countries can benefit from their actions without doing anything.
This causes the active country to be at an economic disadvantage by combating
transnational pollution. This is a serious hindrance that needs to be overcome
before any serious steps can be taken towards a combined effort at mitigating
transnational pollution.
Since then,
Singapore has offered to continue this collaboration, but has not yet received
a response from Indonesia. This highlights another problem with transnational
pollution, which is that without the political will of the source country, not
much can be done without infringing on the sovereignty of the source country.
“Basically this demonstrates that the
government of Indonesia is less serious in dealing and improving forest
governance, despite their previous commitments to do so.” says Yuyun Indradi, a
forests campaigner at Greenpeace Southeast Asia. Some have expressed that this problem
with political will is one that Indonesia - as well as other developing
countries - will continue to face, until they start prioritizing environmental
interests over financial ones. One thing for sure - other countries are caught
helpless as national sovereignty prevents them from taking direct action
towards the mitigation of this problem.
Until then, external agencies such as international governments and non-governmental organizations can only continue to assert their authority in less direct ways, such as through exerting pressure over the Indonesian government and appealing to third parties with leverage over the Indonesian government for action.
Until then, external agencies such as international governments and non-governmental organizations can only continue to assert their authority in less direct ways, such as through exerting pressure over the Indonesian government and appealing to third parties with leverage over the Indonesian government for action.
by Gan Sylvia
Photo courtesy of http://www.straitstimes.com/breaking-news/se-asia/story/haze-malaysia-caused-local-sources-says-official-20140226
Photo courtesy of http://www.straitstimes.com/breaking-news/se-asia/story/haze-malaysia-caused-local-sources-says-official-20140226
