JAKARTA, March 27 (Xinhua) -- The Indonesian government on Wednesday threatened to quit the Paris accord on climate change if the European Union keeps moving with a plan to bar crude palm oil (CPO) from being used in raw materials for bio-fuel, a senior minister said.
The move came after the European commission passed delegated acts classifying CPO as a product that is not sustainable, leading to exemption of the commodity from the list of raw materials for the eco-friendly transport fuel. The acts will be brought to the EU's parliament which will decide within 2 months whether to enforce it or not by 2030.
"If the United States and Brazil can exit from the climate deal. We consider it because it is linked with the interests of the Indonesian people," Indonesia's Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan stressed.
The minister said that the government would firmly defend its national interests as over 20 million people across the country rely much on the palm oil sector which has created many jobs and helped alleviate poverty in the country.
The European Union has often accused that palm oil plantations have contributed to the deforestation which threatens the habitat of several endangered species.
However, Indonesia has rebuffed the accusation, saying that the country's growers have applied a sustainable and eco-friendly way of cultivation of the commodity.
