In Sungai Tohor, Indonesia, villagers make a modest living exporting a product gathered from their nearby jungle. However, these 26,000 acres of trees are at risk of being cut down. Robert Eshelman delves into this catastrophe in his article, “Indonesia’s Billion-Dollar Climate Experiment.”
The leaders in Indonesia want to allow a paper-making company to deforest this area to plant new trees used to create paper products; this would lower the jungle’s ecological diversity and ruin the soil. Indonesia’s jungles contain diverse species and support 30 million citizens. Indonesia also has the third highest C02 emission rates because deforestation releases massive amounts of CO2 into the air, adding to the effects of global warming. The Indonesian government is more concerned with making money than their effects on the world’s climate. The United Nations has created a program to pay Indonesia and other emerging countries to protect forests.
The United Nation’s purpose is to create a collaboration of countries across the world to solve crucial problems. The government in Indonesia is dishonest; the president’s concerns lie with the large companies, rather than the livelihood of his citizens. By giving money to Indonesia, the president would not have to turn to these destructive companies to answer their fiscal troubles. This maintains the jobs of the citizens and the diversity of the jungles.
In the Bible, Luke 12:48, it says the following: “To whom much is given, much will be required.” People have different talents or objects for a reason; they need to use them to benefit others. In this case, it is the responsibility of developed countries to aid the struggling Indonesian government to do what is right for its people and the environment.
If this passes by without action, our nature will become nothing more than highly-organized and controlled plantations.
It is our world. We eat, breath, and live on this planet. And to make a healthy home for mankind, we must work together to solve our environmental problems. If the jungles are at risk because of a lack of money, those with money should rise up and support the cause.