BANGKOK – More than 700,000 hectares of forest in Indonesia have been cleared for mining since 2001, including large tracts of primary forest, a new analysis using satellite data has found.
An estimated 150,000 hectares of that was primary forest, areas with high carbon stock and tall trees that include intact old growth, according to the analysis released this week. “Open-pit mines are easily identified… by their concentric lines of benches cut into the pit sides for coal mines, or by their tendency to be located along river banks, for gold,” he explained.
Using historical satellite images also allowed them to detect now-abandoned mines that have become overgrown.
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