India’s palm oil ambitions for northeast frontier stir concern

Environmentalists, academics, social activists and farmers in India are opposing a government plan to expand palm oil production in northeastern border states because they believe it will not benefit farmers and harm the environment.

“I hardly earn 30,000 rupees ($400) yearly profit after spending on fertilizers, pesticides, laborers and transport,” said Lalchhana Hmar, 70, who grows fresh fruit bunches (FFB) of oil palm. His village in Kolasib, a district in Mizoram State, is close to Myanmar.

“I want to switch to other cash crops of areca nut and bamboo, but to uproot over 100 fully grown oil palms on two hectares will be expensive,” Hmar told Nikkei Asia. “I am stuck.”

Mizoram’s department of agriculture started encouraging farmers to cultivate oil palms in 2006, and provided free saplings and water tanks. Hmar was among the first to get on board with the scheme, but he ran into lower FFB prices than expected. Cultivating pineapples around the palms also did not work out.

New Delhi has now got involved. In August, the cabinet of Prime Minister Narendra Modi approved the National Mission on Edible Oils, which promotes oil palm production in the northeast and on the Andaman and Nicobar islands. An investment of 110 billion rupees was announced to increase plantations to 1 million hectares from the present 34,000 hectares.

More than half the hectarage will be in eight northeastern states. Currently only northeastern states produce oil palm. Mizoram is by far the largest producer with 28,000 hectares under cultivation compared to Nagaland’s 1,973 hectares.

The plan “will be a game-changer when it comes to helping oil palm farmers and creating an Aatmanirbhar Bharat,” Modi tweeted back in August. The Hindi term means “self-reliant India.”

India is at present the world’s biggest importer of palm oil. It brought in 7.2 million tons of crude and refined palm oil worth $5.1 billion in 2020, according to U.N. data. Of this, 93% was from Indonesia and Malaysia. The two countries produce about 80% of the world’s palm oil.

Oil palms originally came from west Africa and prosper in the tropics but need abundant water, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature. Critics say palm oil plantations cause deforestation, destroy rainforests and natural habitat, and increase greenhouse gas emissions.

India’s northeastern states are part of the Indo-Burma biodiversity hotspot. They are home to some 8,000 flora species, 35% of which are endemic. There are nearly 2,200 species of fauna, of which 24% are endemic.

Although the government evidently regards the region as suited to oil palm cultivation, others are less convinced.

“Before making policies on planting oil palm at such large scale, the government needs to carry out research,” said R. Lalnuntluanga, an environmental science professor at Mizoram University. “Oil palm, a water-guzzling crop, requires 120-150 mm of water per month. The majority of the land in these states is hilly and does not have irrigation.”

According to Lalnuntluanga, rainfall in the region has also become erratic in recent years due to climate change. Heavy rains occur once in two to three months, but other months can be dry.

“As the plant requires high nutrients, land degenerates at a faster speed affecting land fertility,” said Lalnuntluanga, noting that farmers are then less able to grow vegetables and fruits for their own consumption.

Some do support the government, however.

“The move is good for India and Mizoram,” H. Lalrintluanga, secretary of the Kolasib District Oil Palm Growers Society, told Nikkei. “Traditional oil seeds like sesame or mustard are not long-lasting crops. Oil palm gives fruit for 20 to 25 years, and there is a market for oil palm in all seasons even though rates are sometimes low.”

But Hmar is just one of the farmers who tells a different story. According to Zion Lalremrauta, secretary of All Mizoram Farmer’s Union, only rich farmers with plenty of land make profits. “Marginal farmers with land in the hills struggle to get water and have to pay a lot to transport heavy FFB,” he told Nikkei. “Many farmers have already stopped cultivating it due to losses.”

Environmentalists are also critical.

India’s commitment to the Paris Agreement in 2015 included the creation of an additional carbon sink of 2.5-3 billion tons of CO2, and to at least 33% green cover across the country by 2030 — a goal embedded in national forestry policy.

“If the government promotes oil palm that causes deforestation in biodiversity-rich states, how will we achieve these goals?” asked Rituraj Phukan, a climate activist in the region.

Indian zoologists who have studied the ecological impact of monoculture in Mizoram said in a 2016 research paper that they found 70 bird species in rainforest interiors, 50 in mixed farming areas, but just 10 species in palm oil plantations.

Mizoram’s Joint Action Committee on Oil Palm includes three nongovernmental organizations who last month wrote to the government asking for the oil palm proposal to be dropped.

“Expansion of exotic and harmful species like oil palm will harm the fragile ecosystem of the state disrupting ecology and social order,” V. Lalzarzova of the Association for Environment Preservation (ASEP), one of the signatory NGOs, told Nikkei.

“Community land and farms are central to the culture, cuisine and way of life of indigenous tribes, and the disappearance of forests will affect them in the long term,” he said. “Monoculture oil palm cultivation will deprive farmers of a variety of crops they can consume.”

“This is nothing but a land grab by big corporates with the help of government,” said Ram Wangkheirakpam, an environmental activist who runs Indigenous Perspective, an organization in Manipur State, which borders Mizoram.

“The government is luring farmers to cultivate oil palm by giving various incentives, but farmers are not being warned about the long term consequences for the land and environment,” he said.

Nikkei Asia

Tags: India, palm oil, rains, palm oil production, government plan, biggest importer