The Borneo Project

Our Director Jettie Word will be speaking at #Bioneers2025 in Berkeley, CA, alongside an inspiring lineup of movement leaders, activists and innovators! ??? For 36 years, Bioneers has been at the forefront of nature-inspired problem solving, leading critical discussions around justice, regeneration, and transformative change. Join us in Berkeley, CA?next week?to witness incredible talks, hands-on workshops, eye-opening art, and to connect with an incredible community! Learn more about the @Bioneers conference and secure your spot: https://bit.ly/BIO–2025 Find Jettie's session on March 27th from 3:00 pm to 4:15 pm: https://bit.ly/422GZSw

For years, Indigenous communities in Sarawak fought against logging on their lands. Today, they can claim a rare victory as timber giant Samling has withdrawn from logging native forests in the Baram?area. Fiona McAlpine writes about the collective efforts of the Stop the Chop coalition in achieving this win. This alliance consisted of remote Indigenous communities, local non-governmental organisations (NGOs) SAVE Rivers and KERUAN Organisation, and international advocacy groups Bruno Manser Fund and The Borneo Project. NGO SAVE Rivers is led by Celine Lim, who is a Sustainability Leadership A-List 2023 winner. Know someone creating demonstrable impact in Asia Pacific’s sustainability ecosystem? Nominate them for the A-List 2025 awards: [https://lnkd.in/gVzQX3b8] Read this latest opinion piece on our website!

Indigenous communities in Sarawak win a landmark victory as the Malaysian Timber Certification Council (MTCC) and international timber certifier visit Sarawak to inspect timber operations.

"For years, Indigenous communities in Sarawak fought against logging on their lands. Today, they can claim a rare victory as timber giant Samling has withdrawn from logging native forests in the Baram area." If you are not a subscriber to Eco-Business, you can also read this article at borneoproject.org

The country risk benchmarking system is a critical pillar of the EU Regulation on Deforestation-free Products (EUDR). Ranking jurisdictions helps prioritize limited resources for due diligence and enforcement, and invest in areas where the risks of non-compliance are highest. To work as intended, the methodology underpinning the classification has to be based on objective and transparent criteria, as described in Article 29 of the EUDR. However, the proposal the Commission recently unveiled for this methodology appears to significantly diverge from the text of the regulation. Today, we Human Rights Watch, and 39 partner organizations including Earthsight, ClientEarth, Greenpeace, WWF European Policy Office and Global Witness, urged the Commission to ensure a robust benchmarking system that evaluates environmental and human rights risks, and that is faithful to the text of the EUDR. Link to summary and letter: https://lnkd.in/euagEYPf

Read our latest article explaining why community mapping is so important in Sarawak: "Maps are so deeply ingrained in our lives that we rarely stop to think about their significance.?But for Indigenous communities with tenuous land rights, maps hold a very different kind of power. Instead of charting a path to somewhere new, these maps are tools for staying put – anchoring communities to their ancestral lands and protecting what they treasure most: their culture, livelihoods, and the deep connection to their environment. Community maps become shields against outsiders eager to exploit forests, rivers, and resources. They tell a story of belonging, resilience, and stewardship. Through community mapping, Indigenous peoples reclaim their narratives and reshape how their lands are understood by others." Read the full article here: https://lnkd.in/gXRhJCeq

Sarawak’s so-called green revolution is little more than a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Companies and the state government are operating in ways that not only devastate the environment but also marginalise remote Indigenous?communities. https://lnkd.in/gSZ8sWUN

????? The cancellation of a high-profile, Indigenous-led conservation project in Sarawak has cast doubt over the future of the heavily-logged Malaysian state’s last patch of intact primary forest. Forest Department Sarawak (FDS) announced the termination of the Upper Baram Forest Area (UBFA) project – also known as the Baram Peace Park – on 10 October, due to “ongoing challenges and disruptions in project implementation.” The forestry agency’s director Hamden Mohamad said in a statement last week that the project had encountered “interference” from local and international NGOs, which has led to “distrust and the spread of misleading information among local communities,” and that the project would be seeking alternative sources of funding. Read the full story: https://lnkd.in/giw44bfS

With 225 other organisations from 42 countries, we Human Rights Watch call on the European Parliament and all EU governments to reject the European Commission’s proposal to delay by twelve months the application of the EUDR. ? The EU deforestation-free products regulation (EUDR) is a flagship achievement of the European Green Deal. It is a world-first in the fight?against deforestation, forest degradation and associated human rights impacts, which are driven by?European production and consumption of products like beef, leather, palm oil, coffee, cocoa, timber,?rubber, and soy. We have no time to lose. ? https://lnkd.in/eVPFX8y4

Here is an illustration of the absurd justifications for delaying the #EUDR. Below is a map of one #palmoil concession in Peninsula #Malaysia that has bulldozed approximately one thousand hectares of #rainforest after the December 2020 cut off date. This required tightly choreographing dozens of pieces of heavy machinery to cut over 230km of roads and terraces into hillsides. These are the pink squiggly lines. As you can see, this is a complex endeavor that likely cost millions of dollars. We used high resolution satellite imagery to confirm that palm was planted and identified over 60 downstream companies who now risk being exposed to this potentially non-compliant palm. But lobbyists managed to convince the European Commission that a delay was needed because of the time and expense it costs to map and monitor their suppliers. Everyday, professional forest monitors like us observe the skills and resources that companies martial to clear forest, so we have a hard time believing that they can't draw a map.