Mongabay: The Indonesian agriculture minister's recent comments that the Aru archipelago in the country's eastern waters will be one of three sites for a major new sugarcane initiative has sparked an outcry among civil society groups.
Just last year, Aru, a cluster of around 90 islands in Indonesia's Maluku province, caught the national spotlight when Malaysia-based Menara Group acquired rights to three quarters of its 629,000 hectares as part of a massive plantation venture. Following a public outcry fueled...