India's Plan Spark Ecological Concerns, Controversy

India, the world's largest palm oil importer, has unveiled an ambitious plan to promote the cultivation of the crop at home that has environmentalists and politicians concerned about deforestation, ecological damage, and human rights violations, Siddhartha Kumar reported for Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa).

Photo Insert: India is currently the world's largest oil importer.

The government recently allocated 1.5 billion dollars to boost annual palm oil production to 2.8 million tons by 2029-30, from its current 300,000 tons, and cut the country's heavy dependence on imports from Indonesia and Malaysia.

The National Mission on Edible Oils-Oil Palm (NMEO-OP) will support farmers in expanding areas under oil palm cultivation to 1 million hectares, from 370,000 hectares, with a "special focus" on the north-eastern states and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the Indian Ocean. Both these regions are among India's main biodiversity hotspots and are ecologically fragile.

Environmental experts and politicians warn that the move to promote cultivation could be "disastrous" given the widespread damage to rainforests and biodiversity caused by oil palm plantations in South-East Asia.

There are concerns that plantations of oil palm, a water-guzzling crop that grows best in tropical areas, will replace forest covers while triggering water scarcity, leading to deforestation and loss of habitat for endangered wildlife, agricultural scientist GV Ramanjaneyulu tells dpa.

"As a monoculture crop which ruins biodiversity, forests, and ecosystem, it will have far bigger adverse effects, by impacting monsoon, temperatures, and leading to climate change," says Ramanjaneyulu, who heads the Hyderabad-based Centre for Sustainable Agriculture. Lawmaker Agatha Sangma, who belongs to the north-eastern Meghalaya state, demanded wider consultation on the plan in a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

She flagged concerns that commercial plantations would detach tribespeople from their identity linked with community ownership of lands and "wreak havoc on the social fabric."

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