Considering the EU is one of the top destinations for its CPO exports, Indonesia has further demanded fair treatment from the EU and has even threatened to take retaliatory action, such as pulling out of the Paris Agreement, stopping the import of Airbus aircrafts, and imposing high tariffs on EU dairy products (BBC News Indonesia, 2019 Jong, 2019 Pandey, 2019 Zaki & Syahputra, 2021). Viewing Europe’s decision as an affront to the UN SDGs as they relate to improving global standard of living, Indonesia has brought the case before the WTO, citing trade discrimination and violations of the fundamental principles of the WTO (Saptiko & Fauzi, 2019). As the biggest CPO producer in the world with 40 million tons per year, and with the livelihoods of 17 million Indonesian farmers in jeopardy, Indonesia refused to take the issue lightly. Chief among these is the decision to begin limiting the imports and use of CPO as a biofuels feedstock as of 2023, with the aim of eventually banning its use entirely by 2030 (Delegation of the European Union to Indonesia and Brunei Darussalam, 2019a, 2019b European Commission, 2019 Parmar, 2020). After issuing RED I in 2007 and enforcing a palm oil sustainability certification system, the EU has recently reached several drastic new decisions regarding the future of palm oil in the European Union that gravely upset Indonesia.
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