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Papua New Guinea suspends controversial grants of community forest lands to foreign corporations

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Published on Wednesday, 11 May 2011 20:19

The Government yesterday stepped into the Special Agricultural and Business Leases controversy and ordered a Commission of Inquiry (COI). All logging permits granted under such leases are also suspended until the COI carries out its investigations and presents its report and recommendations to Parliament.
According to the Post Courier, Acting Prime Minister Sam Abal announced the government_Ž“s intentions in a statement yesterday: "the Commission will investigate the grant of Special Purpose Agriculture and Business Leases, covering some 5.2 million hectares of customary land to ensure all legal requirements have been followed and that the leases are being used for the purposes intended in the legislation". Mr Abal said the government was very concerned about the issue and wanted to ensure that the rights and interests of customary landholders were protected.
Mr Abal also announced there would be an immediate moratorium on the issuing of any further Special Purpose Agriculture and Business Leases until the COI completed its findings and presented its report to Parliament, and its recommendations debated: "Further, all Forest Clearance Authorities granted under the existing leases are to be suspended until the Commission of Inquiry process has been completed. This is to ensure that forest areas are not cleared where there may be no guarantee that genuine agricultural projects will follow" Mr Abal said.

Papua New Guinea has two types of land ownership: customary land or land that is owned by the indigenous people of this country, whose ownership rights and interests are regulated by customs and alienated land which is no longer under customary ownership.
Only 3 per cent of the land area of PNG is alienated land while 97 per cent is under customary ownership.
But the SABLs have changed that as already the area covered is more than 10 per cent of the country.
Villagers in Northern, East New Britain, Central, Gulf and Western Province are angry that the Government had given away more than 5 million hectares of pristine forest for Special Agricultural and Business Leases without their knowledge and consent, as provided for under the Lands Act. In a joined statement last month, affected landowners described the Special Agricultural and Business Leases as structural theft of customary land.