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Stew Amy Johnson from Below Deck recently shared some revealing insights into what it was like to work with chef Ben Robinson and chef Leon Walker during season 3.

Johnson joined her brother Kelley on Below Deck Galley Talk to dish about the latest episodes. She admitted that watching the show gave her a little bit of PTSD. However, [Filming Below Deck Galley Talk] was an absolute blast, she dished with Showbiz Cheat Sheet.

It was so fun to get to hang out with my brother. Just chill on the couch and watch the episodes and see them all together, she said. And also to be on this side of the drama! Like getting to eat, drink some wine, and watch it all go down and not be part of it.

While shes not involved in the drama this season, she humored Showbiz Cheat Sheet with a journey down memory lane. She recounted what it was like to work with Robinson but also shared that Walker was as intense as he seemed on the show.

Walkers signature beef cheeks and endless disdain for chief stew Kate Chastain didnt seem to unnerve Johnson, who is known for her sweet and sunny disposition. Even though she managed to smile her way through some awkward moments on the show, she was candid about her impression of Walker.

You know, it was interesting with Leon because he didnt say much, she recalled. You didnt know if, like, those daggers were like he was going to bring out his knife set and start throwing knives? Or if he was just going over the menu in his head.

You never knew what to expect from him because he never really talked that much, she went on to day. And thats always a little scary to me. Im like, tell us whats going on in there, so we can, you know, move past it. But he was just so reserved that you just didnt know which way he was going.

RELATED: Below Deck Med: Hannah Ferrier Reveals the Jaw-Dropping Salary for a Chief Stew

Indeed, Walker preferred to use other ways to express his frustration with the crew. Years later, Chastain shared that the animosity was so bad with Walker he poured honey in her bed when she was off the boat. Fun fact: Leon poured an entire jar of honey in my bed while I was off the boat during season 3, shetweeted in March.

Robinson is a longstanding Below Deck fan favorite. He came in to save the day when Walker was fired and finished the season with the crew. Johnson worked with Robinson during both seasons 2 and 3 and she said hes definitely unpredictable.

You just never know what youre going to get with that one, right? Johnson laughed. Yeah, hes very entertaining and I enjoy him personally. But professionally, hes a little tough to work with because youre kind of doing a song and dance to whatever temperament youre doing that day or that meal because it would change a lot.

RELATED: Below Deck: Kate Chastain Reveals How She and Rhylee Gerber Got Busted Behind the Scenes

But hes great at his job, she remarked. And he is a hoot in the galley. I mean, when hes not, you know, screaming and not, for the most part, is very, very funny. Fun to be around.

Johnson and the rest of the Below Deck Galley Talk crew will have plenty to say when a new episode airs on Friday, Jan. 15 at 8 p.m. ET/PT on Bravo.

Read more:
'Below Deck': Amy Johnson Admits Chef Ben Was Crazy To Work With but Says Chef Leon Was a Little Terrifying (Exclusive) - Showbiz Cheat Sheet

A $2.25-million project to replace the bridge deck and superstructure to the 400-foot long, 31-foot wide bridge over the CSX railroad just north of Holland Road is set to begin later this month.

The Department of Public Works said preliminary work on the Lake Cohoon Road bridge would begin in late January, with the road closing in late February. The road is expected to reopen in late December.

Allan Myers Inc. of Glen Allen submitted the winning bid.

The abutments and columns will be restored on the nearly 60-year-old bridge, as they will not need to be replaced, according to the Department of Public Works.

The city will advise the public on road closure dates and detour information and will post signage ahead of the road closure.

According to an April 2020 inspection report, the bridges overall condition was rated poor, structurally deficient and scheduled for rehabilitation. The bridge has a sufficiency rating of 67.2%. Bridge ratings are determined by the condition of different aspects of a bridge, which are rated from 0 (failed) to 9 (excellent).

VDOT notes that a structurally deficient bridge is one in which the riding surface, the supports directly underneath it or the substructure are rated in a condition of 4 or less.

The Virginia Department of Transportation notes that a structurally deficient bridge does not imply that it is likely to collapse or that it is unsafe, but that it must be monitored, inspected and maintained.

The report noted, among other things, hairline map cracks, debris along both shoulders, numerous failing patches throughout the bridge and multiple delaminations, or bridge defects.

The bridge deck also has a steel plate on it that moves when a vehicle drives over it, according to the report, and it has multiple cracks in the concrete.

The wearing surface, expansion joints, bearing devices and structural condition of the bridge were all rated poor, while the substructures of the bridge were mostly rated in fair or good condition.

According to VDOT, an average of 1,465 vehicles travel daily over the bridge.

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Lake Cohoon bridge deck to be replaced - The Suffolk News-Herald - Suffolk News-Herald

Spokane street crews hope to have the hundreds of trees and debris that fell into city streets during Wednesdays windstorm completely cleared by Sunday, working 20 hours a day with employees from several different departments.

As of Friday morning, there were more than 100 trees left to clear throughout the city, many of which are on the South Hill. Clint Harris, director of Spokanes street department, said the city had pulled employees from other departments and work, such as bridge repair and water, and assigned them to tree removal to clear streets as soon as possible.

Its all hands on deck for this clean up, he said.

He said many of the city employees who have been deployed around town to clean up fallen trees have only had one day off, if any, between large weather events after the city had to quickly transition both workers and equipment from handling snow and ice to cleaning up after the massive windstorm that disrupted power and internet and knocked down hundreds of trees throughout the city and county.

He said smaller trees and debris can usually be cleared in an hour or two, but there have been several old and very large trees that have taken six or seven hours for street crews to remove from the right-of-way. The largest tree street crews have cleared had a diameter that was close to 4 feet.

Sean Barley, the lead foreperson for city street crews that were working on the South Hill, said more trees fell in the 2015 windstorm, but the trees that fell in this windstorm were much larger, with some causing significant damage. Many of the trees that fell were Ponderosa pines or Douglas fir.

These are the trees that somebodys grandfather planted, he said.

He said in some neighborhoods, it took a full day to clear a single block, because of the concentration of old trees and the damage to natural gas and sewage lines after they were ripped from the ground.

Harris said safety has also been a concern for workers as they try to keep traffic and pedestrians away from work sites, and wait for Avista and other departments to address downed power lines or natural gas leaks caused by the storm.

Barley said street teams had stopped counting trees and were now just keeping track of debris by how many trucks they loaded. He said he counted 16 truckloads of debris in the first three hours of work Friday morning. Once the trees and debris are loaded, theyre transported to an empty lot to eventually be put through a wood chipper.

Marlene Feist, director of strategic development and public works for the city, said about 150 trees have fallen into the right-of-way and about 130 trees had fallen in parks.

Spokane County has also seen hundreds of trees or debris fall into the road, but workers have pushed most of the debris to the sides for now, making it safe to drive. Spokane County Public Works and Information Outreach Manager Martha Lou Wheatley-Billeter said it would take county employees three to four weeks to clear debris from the road, and workers have found debris or trees on 140 roads across the countys road system, ranging from very rural areas to suburban neighborhoods.

Its going to take a while for us to get everything cleared up, she said.

Excerpt from:
Spokane puts 'all hands on deck' in hopes of clearing remaining trees by Sunday - The Spokesman-Review

Most of the roughly 15 people living there now have been offered spots in a new tiny house village opening soon in North Portlands St. Johns neighborhood.

PORTLAND, Ore. More than five years after putting down roots on publicly-owned land, essentially daring the city to make them move amid a newly-declared housing crisis, residents of North Portlands self-governed homeless village Hazelnut Grove have learned their days are numbered.

The announcement came Monday via a news release that quoted both Mayor Ted Wheeler and Housing Commissioner Dan Ryan. Neither was available for an interview.

Describing the villages hillside location along North Greeley Avenue near North Interstate Avenue, the release read, Steep slopes create a danger of landslides and other environmental problems. The location is difficult for firefighters to access, jeopardizing residents safety in this wooded setting.

The release added the reason for decommissioning the village now was simple: residents have somewhere to go.

Most of the roughly 15 people living there now have been offered spots in a new tiny house village opening soon in North Portlands St. Johns neighborhood. The rest, the release said, will be offered emergency housing and shelter space, a process being coordinated through the local nonprofit Do Good Multnomah.

Officials plan to start clearing out the village within the next month.

Barbara Weber, whos been living in Hazelnut Grove for about a year, said residents knew this might happen. Still, theyre furious.

I've suffered chronic homelessness. I know what that feels like, Weber said in an interview Tuesday. That's it. And I want to be with this community, and [the city] promised to move this community to land where they could be self-governed together, not ripped apart.

Weber added residents have started working with a local branch of the Poor Peoples Campaign, a movement founded by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1967. They started a petition to try and convince city officials to change their minds. In a couple weeks, theyve gathered more than 2,000 signatures.

In Mondays news release, the city showed no signs of reversing course.

Its understandable that people have passionate opinions on both sides. Were making decisions that affect peoples sense of safety and their living environment, Commissioner Dan Ryan was quoted saying in the release. I want to thank everybody involved for working together to find a respectful, innovative, and safe solution.

That said, city officials have promised to clear out Hazelnut Grove before. Those plans have never come to fruition.

On Tuesday, Chris Trejbal, the vice chair of the Overlook Neighborhood Association, said hes hopeful this latest plan is for real.

They've identified a new spot in the St. Johns Village that a lot of the residents can move to. They've worked with the other residents to identify places for them to go, he said. So, I think there really is intent on the part of the city to follow through this time.

The association, as well as many residents in that neighborhood, which sits just up the hill from Hazelnut Grove, have called on the city to move the village since its inception.

Earlier this year, they sent a letter to every sitting city commissioner and the Joint Office of Homeless Services, demanding officials keep their years-old promise to disband the village.

The current situation is a humanitarian catastrophe, the letter read. Living outdoors puts peoples health at risk and leaves them vulnerable to victimization. Meanwhile, campsites are causing environmental damage to our communities, rendering public spaces and parks unusable by the public, and are documented launching points for property damage, theft and other reported crimes.

Trejbal didnt know of the citys concrete plan until Monday. He said hes grateful for the movement. He added, amid historic job losses tied to the pandemic, homelessness appears to be rising, and the city has more work to do.

There's a lot of camping that goes on along Going Street out to Swan Island, and then in Madrona Park that is very troublesome, Trejbal said. There have been multiple fires there in the past year. These are areas that we're going to continue to advocate for the city to take action on.

Read more here:
After five years, city of Portland vows to clear homeless village 'Hazelnut Grove' - KGW.com

BANGKOK (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Converting large areas of land for farming to boost food supplies increases planet-heating emissions and places a greater burden on poorer nations already bearing the brunt of climate change, researchers warned on Tuesday.

A study led by Arizona State University (ASU) analysed about 1,500 large land deals totalling 37 million hectares (91 million acres) - across Southeast Asia, Latin America, Africa and eastern Europe - showed that clearing the land for farming may have emitted about 2.3 gigatonnes of carbon emissions.

With regulations to limit land conversion or to protect forests, emissions could have been reduced to 0.8 gigatonnes, according to the study, published this month in the journal Nature Food.

Its unrealistic to say that we cant convert more land, given that the worlds population is growing, especially in developing countries, said Chuan Liao, assistant professor in ASUs School of Sustainability and the studys lead author.

But we still must minimise carbon emissions while pursuing agricultural development, he said.

A sharp increase in food prices in 2007 triggered a global rush for land to increase food security, with wealthier nations and multinational businesses snapping up land in poorer nations.

Worldwide, land is increasingly concentrated in fewer hands, mainly those of large agriculture businesses and investors, with the largest 1% of farms operating more than 70% of the worlds farmland, according to a 2020 study.

While the socio-economic consequences of such deals have been apparent - including threats to the livelihoods of smallholder farmers - regulations to limit environmental damage are rare, as the goal is to boost food output, Liao said.

Enforcing environmental policies does not reduce the amount of land that can be used for agricultural development, he said.

Yet it is difficult, given the host-country governments are so keen to catch up through agricultural development, he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

So it is best to balance the two needs by allowing agricultural development on lands with lower carbon values or low forest cover, and by revitalising abandoned farmlands to generate lower carbon emissions, he said.

Carbon dioxide is the main greenhouse gas responsible for rising temperatures. Total 2019 emissions of carbon dioxide equivalent (GtCO2e) hit a record 59.1 gigatonnes, according to United Nations data.

Agriculture and deforestation account for nearly a quarter of greenhouse gas emissions globally - greater than the share of the transport sector.

The coronavirus pandemic has brought into sharp focus the impacts of rapid urbanisation and deforestation, which have also contributed to the spread of infectious diseases.

Last week, green group WWF said that the world has lost tropical forest equivalent to the size of California over a 13-year period to 2017, with commercial agriculture the leading cause of deforestation.

To meet growing food demand, it is necessary to raise output on existing croplands, and enforce laws to limit land conversion to protect high-carbon-value forests while permitting agricultural development on low-carbon value land, Liao said.

The pandemic makes both conservation and food security more urgent, he added.

Reporting by Rina Chandran @rinachandran; Editing by Michael Taylor. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers the lives of people around the world who struggle to live freely or fairly. Visit news.trust.org

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Feeding the world while saving the planet a 'difficult' balancing act - Reuters

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) for Nature's report on deforestation hotspots, published on Thursday, reveals that almost half of the original forested area in eastern Australia has been lost, with 700 native flora and fauna species, including koalas, threatened as a result. Unsplash

Why Global Citizens Should Care

Australia is the only developed country listed in a new report highlighting the worlds top 24 deforestation zones, due to its significant logging and excessive land clearing for cattle pasture in New South Wales (NSW), Queensland, Victoria and Tasmania.

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) for Nature's report on deforestation hotspots, published on Thursday, reveals that almost half of the original forested area in eastern Australia has been lost, with 700 native flora and fauna species, including koalas, threatened as a result. The report said Australia's notable deforestation could also be attributed to mining, fires, transport infrastructure and urban expansion.

WWF Conservation Scientist Martin Taylor said Australia's lax environmental regulations allowed for widespread damage.

"Land clearing rates rocketed after the axing of restrictions in Queensland and NSW, placing eastern Australia alongside the most infamous places in the world for forest destruction," Taylor said in a WWF media release. "Despite Queensland restoring some restrictions in 2018, eastern Australia remains a deforestation front. That will not change until we see rates of destruction go down."

Across 2015 and 2016, 395,000 hectares were cleared in Queensland alone, the equivalent of 1,500 football fields a day.

Bulldozing in Queensland killed 45 million animals and created 45 million tonnes of carbon emissions.

Although Australia's 2019 Black Summer bushfires were not included in the report, as it tracked deforestation from 2004 to 2017, experts fear climate change-induced fires and their effect on Australia will become a prominent, recurring theme in future reports.

"Forest destruction was already bad enough for the region to be declared a global deforestation front, then the 2019-20 bushfires burned about 12.6 million hectares in eastern Australia," the report said. "Forest fires are likely to increase due to longer and more extreme dry seasons as a result of climate change."

Related Stories April 2, 2020 Australias Environment Scores 0.8 Out of 10 in 2019: Report

Eastern Australia has been looped in with 10 other "medium" deforestation fronts, including hotspots in Colombia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Angola, Zambia, Peru, Laos, Central African Republic and Mozambique. Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay, Argentina, Madagascar and Borneo were all marked in the "high" deforestation category.

Overall, 43 million hectares of land roughly the size of Morocco has been destroyed globally since 2004.

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Australia Is the Only Developed Country Featured on WWF's List of Deforestation Hotspots - Global Citizen

IPSWICH Open burning begins Jan. 15, and a burn permit is required to be in compliance with state law, fire Chief Andy Theriault has said.

Residents with matches can apply for permits online. There is a $10 fee to acquire a burn permit.

Residents who have already obtained permits need to visit the Ipswich Fire Departments online activation page to activate their permit on the day they plan to burn.

Residents will then be informed if burning is allowed that day and instructed to leave their address, as listed on the permit.

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The requirement to check in each day is based on changing atmospheric and weather conditions, such as wind or air dryness. The departments on-duty shift commanders will make a determination before 9 a.m. each day whether burning will be allowed in town.

Violations of the permit requirements, open burning law, and/or open burning regulations will be grounds for permit revocation.

According to Massachusetts law, anyone found burning without a permit may be subject to criminal charges, the punishment for which is a fine of up to $500 plus the cost of suppression or by imprisonment for up to one month, or both.

Open burning must be done:

Residents are allowed to burn:

You may not burn:

Theriault said resdients can help prevent wildland fires by burning early in the season. Wet and snowy winter conditions help hinder the rapid spread of fire on or under the ground, he added.

April is usually the worst month for brush fires. When snow recedes, but before new growth emerges, last years dead grass, leaves and wood are dangerous tinder, the fire department announcement said.

The fire department advised:

Anyone with questions regarding opening burning should call the Ipswich Fire Department at 978-356-4321.

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Originally posted here:
Open burning begins today, permit needed - The Local Ne.ws

Pacific Gas and Electric keeps electricity flowing through 81,000 miles of overhead distribution power lines. This happens across the cities and over the mountains of PG&Es service area from the Pacific Ocean to the Sierra Nevada, Eureka to Bakersfield, according to their website.

Common sense says maintaining the lines day after day, year after year, decade after decade is a feat of planning and hard work.

Another important requirement by all the states utility companies is keeping the thick forest and woodland brush under the lines cut back. The brush has been accumulating for 100 years of fire suppression in the ranges and mountains across California.

Common sense says wildfire loves big fuel.

The Karuk Tribe in Siskiyou and Humboldt counties want to help. They wrote a report with a plan to maintain corridors under PG&Es distribution and service lines in the areas of their towns.

Distribution lines are the in-between carriers that relay stepped-down, high voltage electricity from transmission lines to the service lines that connect to the customer structure..

Written with a grant from the PG&E Resilient Communities Foundation, the Karuk plan is simple: lower the risk of dying by uncontrollable fire in and around the remote towns of Orleans and Somes Bar, and do this by clearing power line corridors, and then burning the brush in cooler, wetter months with small, strategic fire.

The report was co-authored by Bill Tripp, who is director of the Tribes Department of Natural Resources, and Kari Marie Norgaard, a professor at the University of Oregon with background in environmental studies, biology and climate change.

Before European descendants arrived along the mid-Klamath River, the Karuk used fire to enhance the environment and to keep fuels in the mountains under control and prevent large conflagrations.

More: 'It was like Armageddon:' Happy Camp families recount escape from Slater Fire

They did this by lighting small, short term fires in mosaic patches, at successively higher elevations, starting in spring and continuing through summer and fall. Fire renewed and maintained the health of the world, it enriched Karuk foods and provided the best quality materials for clothing, tools and ceremonial items. In an interview, Tripp said villages on both sides of the river near present-day Orleans coordinated their burning.

For example, burning leaves in black oak stands lowered fuel levels and was good for the acorns, which the deer like, Tripp said. They wouldnt wait after a fire, theyd come down and would roll around in the burned duff as soon as it cooled off.

The Karuk used smoke, too.

Salmon need cold water, and the Karuk knew that because there is more moisture content in burnable materials in the high country, they could burn at higher elevations and manage the fire. They did this for various other environmental reasons but a primary purpose was to shade the river with the smoke cloud and lower the water temperature. Doing this protected the salmon and promoted migration up river, according to the Tribes Climate Change Adaptation Plan

A century ago, many Karuk were stopped from using fire. They were also stripped of the ability to manage their lands as they always had, and replaced by new managers the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Indian Affairs.

These agencies decided that to avoid large fires they would suppress fire. That meant all fire. Laws were enacted forbidding use of fire on the land, and tribal people were sometimes killed for this, as late as the 1930s, according to an article Tripp wrote for the Guardian.

Despite the hard road, the Karuk focused on reclaiming the lives they choose to live and managing the environment with fire as they have done for the thousands of years theyve lived along the Klamath, according to the Adaptation plan.

They also bought small areas of land, mastered the permit processes, satisfied NEPA and CEQA regulations and, in the 1990s, began combining modern science with traditional uses of fire on their properties, according to Tripp.

In 2018, with the managed fire plan, the Karuk were ready to enlarge the scope of their burning to more strategic managing of the fuel load under the power lines, Tripp said.

With the grant, they gathered data along 41 miles of power line in and around Orleans and Somes Bar. They identified 104 sites in need of initial clearing and then follow-up maintenance. Of the 104 sites, 28 were deemed high risk and in immediate need of clearing; and 41 sites were medium risk.

The report/plan consists of planning and administration, the cutting the trees and bushes under the lines and around power poles and transformers, burning brush in cooler months at safe distances from the infrastructure and ongoing maintenance.

One such site visited by a reporter was up from a treed road on the edge of a meadow, just outside Orleans. Clearing and burning had been done in November around a pole and transformer at the base of a brushy hillside. A service line from the pole swung across the narrow road to a house.

Were doing this ourselves because this is our place, Tripp said. Were trying to fashion a system where we can work with PG&E and other partners, especially where it benefits their infrastructure.

Their report describes how fire starts under electrical lines and other infrastructure in remote, mountainous locations.

Distribution and service lines can ignite because of the mechanical failure of transformers and other equipment, when lines or conductors are close enough to cause arcing, when unmaintained vegetation comes in contact with a line, or when a fallen tree or branch downs a power line.

More: If dams are removed, will there be water for firefighting? KRRC says yes, with new plan

More: How people misbehaving contributed to wildfire chaos in California, Oregon

A tree or a branch that falls on two lines can create an arc between the lines and cause sparks, Tripp explained.

After clearing the land under the lines and around poles, tribal crews collect the brush in small piles. Then, during times of year when moisture content allows for slow-burning, low fire, the material is burned.

Tripp described the difference between the Karuks use of fire and the clearing that power companies perform, one of them being the use of herbicides.

PG&E has implemented treatments around poles weed eating or the application of herbicides. Other places along the highway, they use the CCC (California Conservation Corps) to come in and weed cut around poles.

We dont use herbicides. There are a lot of resources out there on the land that our people use. This infrastructure lies within two miles of our villages. So we dont want herbicides on food and other things that people use. Its poison, our tribal law bans it. Using fire to maintain the landscape is consistent with our culture, Tripp said.

Another PG&E practice the Karuk want to improve on is leaving cut vegetation on the ground because it becomes fuel for a low burning fire directly under the lines.

In response to Karuk concerns, PG&E marketing and communications spokesperson, Lynsey Paulo, wrote in an email that PG&E trims overhanging limbs and branches above power lines and removes hazardous vegetation such as dead, diseased, dying or defective trees that could harm power lines or equipment.

However, neither PG&E nor its contractors has the authority to remove wood because the trees on customers land are their property. As a courtesy, tree crews cut larger limbs into more manageable lengths and leave wood on-site for customer use, Paulo said. Also, customers can request removal of wood debris at no cost.

More: Clean up after Slater Fire underway in Happy Camp

More: Montague double wide destroyed in early morning blaze

The Karuk are working on raising the money to fund an endowment for their plan. This was helped considerably by a follow-up grant from the PG&E Resilient Communities Foundation, which Tripp described as an additional gift to the Tribe for grant writing and fund raising. With the money, the Tribe hired a professional grant writer and a fund raiser.

The goal is to raise $1 million for the endowment. Tripp said this amount would generate enough annual interest to grow the endowment and pay for carrying out the plan. The endowment would also fund the more comprehensive and long-range Climate Change Adaptation Plan. When implemented, this plan seeks to repair and renew the mid-Klamath environment and provide a strategy which the Karuk believe would go farther at lowering the risk, long-term, of catastrophic fire.

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Karuk have a plan to lower risk of fires - Siskiyou Daily News

JAKARTA An upgrade to a road that cuts through one of Southeast Asias last great swaths of intact rainforest is driving deeper encroachment by humans into blocks of forest that may spread into a national park.

The road runs 36 kilometers (22 miles) between the districts of Karo and Langkat in Indonesias North Sumatra province, and for a long time was no more than a dirt track, a 4.1-km (2.5-mi) stretch of which runs through Gunung Leuser National Park.

Authorities recently upgraded the road, paving it over with asphalt, despite calls from UNESCO not to do so. The national park is part of a wider UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Its also part of the Leuser Ecosystem, the last place on Earth where critically endangered rhinos, tigers, elephants and orangutans still coexist in the wild but which has also been eaten away at in recent years by human encroachment for oil palm cultivation and illegal logging.

More than 450,000 hectares (1.1 million acres) of the Leuser Ecosystem have been deforested, leaving 1.8 million hectares (4.4 million acres) of intact rainforest as of 2019, according to data from the NGO Forest, Nature and Environment of Aceh (HAkA).

Activists say they fear more forests and habitat of key species will be lost in near future the newly paved road provides easier access into previously untouched forest areas, eventually carving into the national park itself. The Bukit Barisan public forest park, a neighboring block of forest that isnt subject to the same degree of protection as Gunung Leuser National Park, has already been impacted by the upgrades to the road, groups say.

The forest park has lost 1,200 hectares (3,000 acres) of its tree cover for houses and coffee plantations, according to monitoring by the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi), the countrys largest green group. Officials say the people clearing the forest are evacuees forced out of their homes by ongoing eruptions of the nearby Mount Sinabung volcano. They say these people have set up houses and plantations inside the 51,000-hectare (126,000-acre) public forest park by taking advantage of the new access opened by the upgraded road.

The number of households dotted around the road when it was still a dirt track was 31, according to official data, but mushroomed to 296 in 2019, following the paving.

Sean Sloan, a scientist at James Cook University in Australia who carried out a study in 2018 on the impact of infrastructure development in the wider Leuser Ecosystem, said its only natural for settlements to start appearing after a road has been upgraded.

The history of the Leuser Ecosystem evidences that settlement occurs widely and seemingly illegally along roads once theyre asphalted and made well, he told Mongabay. And so to make another road along the ecosystem further improves the point.

Dana Tarigan, director of Walhis North Sumatra chapter, said he suspected many of the settlers who have encroached into the public forest park arent Sinabung evacuees, but rather part of an organized land grab using the volcanic eruptions as cover to clear the forests and occupy the land.

In the beginning, there might have been evacuees [among the people who moved into the area], but it has turned into an organized crime and the evacuees are being used as a shield, Dana told Mongabay.

He added that the rate of forest clearing 1,200 hectares in just two years was far too intensive to have been carried out by a group of a few hundred impoverished evacuees.

What tools do they use to cut down such a large area? he said. What kind of evacuees, who supposedly have nothing, could encroach into 1,200 hectares of forest?

Some of the settlers have begun selling the land they cleared, making from 30 million rupiah ($2,100) per hectare for an empty lot, to 150 million rupiah ($10,600) per hectare for land planted with crops like coffee.

There have been underhanded dealings going on, with illegal settlement by people from outside Karo, Dana said.

To date, the forest incursion has been confined to the Bukit Barisan public forest park. But as the amount of cleared area expands, the settlements are now less than a kilometer (0.6 miles) from Gunung Leuser National Park. A local activist keeping track of the encroachment says in some areas the land clearing is within a few dozen meters of the national park.

That means its only a matter of time before people started cutting into Gunung Leuser National Park, Dana said.

The incursion is already affecting the regions rare and threatened wildlife, including orangutans. In 2020, there were at least two reports of orangutans seen fleeing from forest areas being cleared.

Muhammad Yusrizal Adi Syaputra, a law lecturer at the Medan Area University in Medan, the North Sumatra capital, carried out an analysis of the road project and its impacts. He said there was a potential for a decline of 28-36% in bird and mammal populations within a 2.6-km (1.6-mi) radius of the road, and a 25-38% decline within a 17-km (10.5-mi) radius.

Sloan said that while the recently upgraded road itself might not cut through the core of the Leuser Ecosystem, its still a major concern.

As far as random roads go, its probably not the most detrimental, but it fits into a larger pattern of laxed regulation, indifference, and piecemeal destruction, he said.

The worst-case scenario is if the road cuts off an area of forest, isolating it entirely, according to Sloan. He adds theres a specific area of forest in the national park that could be easily isolated this way from the rest of the park.

It might house a few dozen orangutans, but that population would die out if the forest becomes isolated, Sloan said.

In its 2020 World Heritage Outlook report, the IUCN also noted the presence of Sumatran orangutans close to the Karo-Langkat road.

Sumatran orangutan, which are critically endangered are known to inhabit the area of the road and therefore the road will likely fragment its habitat, the IUCN said in the report.

Sloan said he was surprised that the proposal to upgrade the road had been approved under UNESCOs watch, given that the U.N. body had recommended the Indonesian government to cease all infrastructure projects that might threaten Gunung Leuser National Park. The park is part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site called the Tropical Rainforest Heritage of Sumatra (TRHS) that has been listed as a World Heritage in Danger since 2011 due to serious and specific infrastructure threats.

In 2013 and 2018, the IUCN conducted monitoring missions to assess the state of the TRHS, including threats and the required corrective measures. The two missions highlighted the Karo-Langkat road as infrastructure that required immediate attention as it bisected Gunung Leuser National Park, including areas frequently used by tigers, elephants and orangutans.

Based on the result of the missions, UNESCOs World Heritage Committee requested the Indonesian government stay committed to not building any new roads within the TRHS and to ensure any road upgrades are only permitted if they could be shown to not cause any negative impact on the areas Outstanding Universal Value.

But in 2018, the IUCN mission learned that two road upgrades inside the TRHS had been recently approved without environmental impact assessments, including the proposal to upgrade the Karo-Langkat road through the national park.

The proposal was made by local officials and lawmakers, who said the road had to be upgraded to develop the local economy and provide an evacuation route in case of natural disasters. In 2016, the Ministry of Environment and Forestry rejected the proposal on the grounds that Gunung Leuser National Park is a World Heritage Site.

After years of trying to get the project approved by the central government, the local government finally managed to obtain a letter from the environment ministry in 2018 that greenlit the project as long as an academic study was conducted first.

Based on that letter, the provincial government allocated 14 billion rupiah ($981,000) for the project in 2018, and construction began shortly after that. But Gunung Leuser National Park authorities reportedly blocked the project, triggering protests from local communities and officials.

Baskami Ginting, the speaker of the North Sumatra provincial legislature, said the letter from the ministry should have been enough for the project to proceed. After the initial objection from the national park authorities, the project resumed and now had been completed.

The IUCN expressed concern over the completion of the project in its report, saying the government had ignored the committees call to not proceed with these upgrades until environmental impact assessments had been undertaken.

Medan Area Universitys Yusrizal said the road wasnt lacking only a proper environmental impact assessment, but also a legal basis.

Its better if the environment ministry gives a permit, but it has to be clear, such as a permit to construct a road, Yusrizal told Mongabay. But until now, I havent found the legal basis [for the road construction]. Ive just found a cooperation agreement to construct the road.

The national park authority says it is working with the Ministry of Public Works and Housing to ensure that the UNESCO-requested strategic environmental assessment and mitigation plan is prioritized in its 20202021 work plan and budget.

Banner image: A Sumatran orangutan with a leaf in its mouth. The Leuser Ecosystem is home to roughly 85 percent of the species remaining population. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay.

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Deforestation spurred by road project creeps closer to Sumatra wildlife haven - Mongabay.com

Siya Ram Raya Yadav, son of 72-year-old farmer Narayan who died from heart attack in Kathmandu a day after agitating sugarcane farmers ended their protest on December 28, is facing financial ruin.

The Yadav family had been selling the sugarcane they grew on their five bighas (1.2 hectares) of land to Annapurna Sugar Mills on credit for years but since the sugar mill did not pay them on time, Narayan was forced to borrow money for the familys expenses and eventually had accrued more loans than the mill owned him.

The principal and interest on the loan the family owes to its creditors stands at Rs2.5 million. The mill has since paid Siya Ram Rs2.1 million out of a total Rs2.4 million dues.

But I have nothing left now, said Siya Ram from Chotaul of Dhankaul Municipality in Sarlahi. We are planning to sell a piece of land to clear the banks loan.

Sugarcane farmers had come to the Capital from December 13 to protest for the second time demanding that their outstanding dues be cleared. They called off their two-week-long protest on December 28 following assurance from the government that mills would pay them within 21 days. The deadline ends on Monday.

It was after the agreement was signed that Siya Ram got some of the payment as other farmers too have, according to the government.

Of the Rs 2.1 million Siya Ram received, he said he spent Rs1.2 million to organise his fathers funeral and Rs700,000 of the outstanding bank loan was paid.

Narayan Regmi, joint-secretary and spokesperson for the Industry Ministry, said based on their record, sugar mills have paid 85 percent of the outstanding dues to the farmers.

Still 15 percent is remaining, he told the Post. The sugar mills have been gradually paying and I hope they will clear it all.

But sugarcane farmers refute this claim.

Rakesh Mishra, patron of the Sugarcane Farmers Struggle Committee, which still exists despite the end of protests, said farmers have not received their payment fully yet.

The Industry Ministry has shared verbally that the sugar mill has paid Rs440.5 million of the Rs650 million, said Mishra. But we do not know how many farmers have been paid and what amount they have been paid.

According to him, the Industry Ministry has only said that sugar mills have deposited the dues to farmers bank accounts but have not provided any proof of that.

How much a particular farmer should receive for what amount of sugarcane and how much has been provided needs to be mentioned clearly and this has not been done so far, he said.

The sugar mills have not even clearly said how much they actually owe, Mishra said.

While farmers say that different sugar mills owe them Rs900 million in total, the government and the mills say they owe Rs650 million.

As part of the agreement signed on December 28, a technical team of a representative each from the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Supplies, Ministry of Home Affairs, Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock Development, Ministry of Finance, and three from among sugarcane farmersone each from the eastern, central and western parts of the countrywas formed to look into this and other issues but the committee has met only once.

We have proof that farmers have dues of more than Rs900 million no matter what the government concludes in its report, Mishra said.

The farmers are confident that the government report will also conclude that this is the amount that is outstanding, according to him.

Last January too, an agreement had been reached between the government and the mills to clear the dues but that remained on paper only.

The Supreme Court has issued an interim order for the sugar mills to make the outstanding payments to sugarcane farmers within one month.

Justice Kumar Regmi issued the ruling on December 31 stating that payment to sugarcane farmers was directly related to their basic rights.

Siya Ram, meanwhile, is not very hopeful that the mill will clear the remaining Rs300,000 it owes.

Not getting the dues is only part of the problem sugarcane farmers face. They dont get chemical fertilisers, such as urea, on time. Harvesting the crop and transporting it to the mills where it is crushed to make sugar adds to the cost. And if rains are not timely, sugarcane farmers suffer more.

When farmers finally get the sugarcane to the mills all they get is a slip of paper: that's what many farmers call a credit card.

Mishra said the government has promised them that once the deadline to clear the dues crosses, bank accounts of the defaulting mills will be frozen and an arrest warrant issued accordingly.

Again, it looks like we may be forced to launch another round of decisive movement, he told the Post. We will hold a discussion on Tuesday to chart our plan.

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Sugar mills are gradually clearing years-long dues, says government but farmers are not satisfied - The Kathmandu Post