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Article

17 May 2020

Author:
Hans Nicholas Jong, Mongabay

Indonesia: Mining law lacks provisions on rehabilitation but lifts cap on size of mining operations

"With new law, Indonesia gives miners more power and fewer obligations," 13 May 2020

Indonesia’s parliament has passed a...bill that effectively gives miners bigger concessions and longer contracts, with fewer environmental obligations.

Among the biggest changes it introduces...is the removal of a limit on the size of mining operations under a single permit, capped by the previous law to 15,000 hectares (37,000 acres).

Another contentious stipulation is on the automatic renewal of mining contracts...Under the new bill, ...contract holders would be allowed to automatically renew their permits two more times for 20 years.

Muhammad Iqbal Damanik, a researcher at the environmental NGO Auriga Nusantara, said allowing these companies to have their permits renewed automatically is problematic because many of them have not carried out the required rehabilitation of their mining sites.

The new law also doesn’t address the cases of abandoned mining pits that have already claimed the lives of 36 people, mostly children...or the responsibilities of the companies that failed to rehabilitate those sites...