01/04/2026

WEDNESDAY | APR 1, 2026

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Sumatra, East Kalimantan see dramatic forest loss

Myanmar general elected

vice-president NAYPYIDAW: State Administration Council chairman Min Aung Hlaing was elected a vice-president by the lower house yesterday. Myanmar’s former commander in chief Min Aung Hlaing has led Myanmar since 2021, when he ousted the government of Aung San Suu Kyi. His election sets in motion a process for him to exchange his uniform for civilian clothes, as the country’s parliament selects three vice-presidents, one of whom is then chosen as president. On the lower house floor yesterday, MPs queued up at a row of tables and dropped their ballots into one of three clear-sided boxes. “The lower house of elected MPs announces Senior General Min Aung Hlaing as a vice president,” lower house speaker Khin Yi said after the vote. Min Aung Hlaing received 247 of the 260 votes, a parliament official said. The upper house elected Nan Ni Ni Aye, a regional MP from Karen state with the military aligned Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), as another vice-president. A third vice-president will be chosen by the military. A parliament-wide vote to select which of the three will be elevated to president is expected this week. The USDP – led and staffed by many retired officers – is entrenched in parliament after winning 80% of elected seats, and it is expected the new government will march in lockstep with the top brass. Min Aung Hlaing is expected to manage a carefully orchestrated transition to becoming president, after he handed over the reins of the military to loyalist Ye Win Oo on Monday. – AFP Thai king endorses new Cabinet BANGKOK: King Maha Vajiralongkorn has endorsed Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul’s new Cabinet, according to a notice in the Royal Gazette yesterday. The approval clears the way for the Cabinet to be sworn in before the king ahead of the delivery of a policy statement to parliament, after which ministers can formally take office. The line-up keeps Finance Minister Ekniti Nitithanprapas and Commerce Minister Suphajee Suthumpun in their posts, as expected. Foreign Minister Sihasak Phuangketkeow also remains in position. Former Industry Minister Akanat Promphan replaces former PTT chief executive Auttapol Rerkpiboon as energy minister. Anutin said over the weekend that the new government would be in place by April. – Reuters

country of 284 million people. The programme has a target of ultimately feeding 83 million people, but it has come under the spotlight after thousands of recipients contracted food poisoning. Earlier this month, presidential spokesman Prasetyo Hadi said the government was seeking to set aside as much as 80 trillion rupiah to shield its economy from the Middle East fallout. Measures under consideration include ordering government workers to work from home one day a week, cutting back on official travel million hectares of forest areas for food-, energy- and water-related programmes last year, 43% of which was natural forest. More than 78,000ha of the “food reserve forest” were cleared last year, an area the size of New York City. As it cleared parts of provinces in Borneo to make room for rice fields, Indonesia said last year that it had achieved self-sufficiency in rice production. “They are gambling, they are speculating ... it’s peat land and not suitable for rice,” Manurung said. Prabowo’s bioenergy push also had a heavy impact, with areas converted to industrial forest to produce biomass and another 37,910ha cleared inside Indonesia’s sprawling oil palm concessions. An additional 41,162ha of forest were converted into coal, gold and nickel concessions, Manurung said. “The presidency is continuing

and encouraging bicycle, electronic car and public transport use to preserve valuable fuel. Analysts said savings from trimming the free meals programme were not nearly enough if the government intends to meet its fiscal deficit limit. “Without changes in big budget (programmes), I don’t see steps such as cutting back on free meals or one day work-from-home per week, as adequate to tackle” the deficit, said Deni Friawan, a researcher at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies. – AFP the pattern of former president Joko Widodo, which uses the so-called national strategic projects and Omnibus Law (Job Creation law) that weaken environmental protection,” he said. Provinces in Borneo saw forests shrink the fastest last year, with Sumatra and Papua ranking second and third. East Kalimantan, the location of Indonesia’s new capital, was the hardest-hit province. Three Sumatran provinces affected by floods and landslides last year showed “dramatic increases in deforestation” with Aceh rising by 426%, North Sumatra by 281% and West Sumatra by 1,034% compared to 2024. The government must improve regulation to ensure that natural forest is better protected and should also expand conservation areas outside forest estates, Manurung said. – Reuters

o Weak environmental protections blamed

Brunei imposes fuel tank rule BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN: Oil-rich Brunei will stop foreign-registered vehicles with fuel tanks less than three-quarters full from entering the country from today to conserve fuel supplies, its energy department said in a statement. Foreign motorists will only be allowed to buy Shell V-Power petrol or diesel from stations selling the fuels at current market prices, the statement released late on Monday said. The requirement for three quarter full tanks will also apply to Brunei-registered vehicles re entering the country twice or more within 24 hours, the department said, adding that petrol stations have been asked to step up monitoring of vehicle registrations. Brunei is facing soaring subsidy costs as it bids to keep pump prices among the lowest in the region, with oil prices surging. Differences in retail pump prices between Malaysia and Brunei have sometimes encouraged fuel smuggling, with motorists travelling across the border to buy cheaper fuel in Brunei. – Reuters At a Cabinet meeting over the weekend, ministers and Prabowo decided to trim the programme from six days a week to five in primary and The programme, which feeds an estimated 60 million children and pregnant and breastfeeding women at a cost of nearly a tenth of the annual budget, is President Prabowo Subianto’s signature project. JAKARTA: Forest loss in Indonesia surged by 66% last year, hitting its highest rate in eight years as a result of weak environmental protections and an ambitious food and energy self-sufficiency drive. The archipelago, made up of thousands of islands, has some of the world’s thickest forests and most biodiverse regions, but it leans heavily on mining and plantations to support its US$1.4 trillion (RM5.6 trillion) economy, which is the biggest in Southeast Asia. Auriga Nusantara, a think tank focusing on forestry and biodiversity in Indonesia, used high-quality satellite images combined with on-the-ground visits to 49,000ha of forest across 16 provinces.

It found that 433,751ha of forest was cleared last year, a dramatic jump from 261,575ha in 2024, said Auriga chairman Timer Manurung . “The surge in deforestation in 2025 is truly distressing, taking Indonesia back to a time when ... (it) was at its highest,” he said, noting that the highest rate of deforestation before 2025 was in 2016, when more than a million hectares were cleared. Manurung identified President Prabowo Subianto’s food security programme as one of the main contributing factors. The programme aims to boost domestic output of key agricultural products like rice and reduce dependence on imports. The government allocated 20.6

Jakarta trims meals programme JAKARTA: Indonesia will make cuts to its free school meals programme as it seeks to set aside billions of dollars to counteract budget pressures brought on by the Middle East war and soaring oil prices. secondary schools from yesterday. In regions with high malnutrition rates, meals will remain available on Saturdays, when many Indonesian schools are open.

The move will save “around 40 trillion rupiah (RM9.3 billion),” said Nanik Sudaryati Deyang, deputy head of the National Nutrition Agency. The cut may be reviewed if conditions change. Launched in January last year, the initiative was touted by the government as a way to tackle a malnutrition and stunting crisis in the

SINGAPORE MATRIX ... The facade of a public housing estate in Singapore shows a television test pattern. – REUTERSPIC