Indonesia cites fires, weather in missing deadline over haze

Meanwhile, Indonesia has asked four countrie, s including Malaysia, for help to fight forest and plantation fires.

NTUC FairPrice, run by the local trade union, said it had made its decision after the Singapore Environment Council (SEC) chose to suspended its green certification for APP’s paper products.

Taking to his official Facebook on Wednesday evening, Singaporean Minister for Foreign Affairs Vivian Balakrishnan said that recent discussions between his office and his Indonesian counterpart, Retno Marsudi, had been productive, with Indonesia finally accepting Singapore’s assistance.

But Indonesia has rejected suggestions it is not doing enough, with the head of the country’s disaster agency saying all possible resources were being used.

Parts of Southeast Asia are suffering from a few of the most severe air pollution in years caused by illegal burning of forests and farmland in Indonesia.

After refusing offers of help from Singapore, Joko Widodo said he had now accepted. The culprits are big corporations, who find it more profitable to set fire to the forests so the peat-filled soil can be planted with palm oil trees and trees for paper pulp.

Part of the reason for the uncertainty is that Indonesia has released little information about the exact sources of the acrid haze.

Borneo is shared between Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei. “They are home to globally threatened wildlife, including the orangutan, southern Bornean gibbon and clouded leopard”, he said.

We’ve heard so much about the current haze crisis in the last few weeks – it has shut down schools, canceled flights, and caused political turmoil between Indonesia and its neighbors.

It is the first time that haze-related problems had affected airline activity in Thailand. “When making loans to companies, we do conduct assessments of how such companies address material risks, including where relevant, their exposure to environmental or social risks”, DBS said yesterday in an e-mailed response to queries. So far, though, there has been little regional cooperation toward resolving the issue.

“Besides fire-fighting, the president [Joko Widodo] has also pledged to prosecute companies and Indonesian agencies have started to name a few”, said Mr. Tan.

Indonesia on Thursday asked several countries including China, Singapore, Russia, and Japan for help to put out fires that have sent choking smoke drifting across the region for weeks.