Mongabay has long reported on the status of Indonesia’s rainforests. Large-scale palm oil plantations continue to be one of the biggest drivers of illegal deforestation in this biodiverse region. A suspicious payment by one of the largest palm oil plantations there spurred a year-long investigation that led to greater transparency and accountability.
A $22 million mystery payment
Produced in collaboration with The Gecko Project, the Korean Center for Investigative Journalism, and Al Jazeera’s 101 East program, Mongabay investigated a $22 million “consultancy” payment connected to a major land deal in Papua, Indonesia.
The payment was made by one of the world’s largest palm oil companies, the Korindo Group, in connection with its acquisition of a land concession in Papua, home to Indonesia’s largest remaining stretch of intact rainforest and dozens of Indigenous communities. Permits have no official cost in Indonesia, so what could it possibly have been for? Mongabay and our partners aimed to find out.
Korindo was unable to offer a coherent explanation. It told conflicting stories to NGOs and our reporting team. We did, however, discover the identity of the “consultant” in Korindo’s financial statements: a Korean-Indonesian businessman named Kim Nam Ku. So we traveled to Papua to learn what he had been up to in one of Indonesia’s remotest regions.
Our report also examined the Korindo plantations’ impact on local communities, who say the company failed to keep its promises to improve their lives through jobs and development. It also sketched out the beginnings of a roadmap for how authorities in multiple jurisdictions, from Indonesia to Singapore and the U.S., could determine whether Korindo’s “consultancy” payment had in fact funded bribery.
Coupled with Mongabay’s investigation and ongoing reportage, a documentary, Selling Out West Papua, ran on Al Jazeera’s 101 East program, produced with Al-Jazeera, The Gecko Project, and the Korea Center for Investigative Journalism. Additionally, Mongabay reported on an independent investigation based on satellite imagery in late 2020. The external investigations concluded the Korindo Group deliberately set fires to clear a Chicago-sized area of rainforest in Papua.
