(Palm Oil – The Green Development Oil Newsletter - Issue 14, July 2011) - Australian Senate Endorses Green Global Campaign for Punitive Labelling of Palm Oil.  The Australian Senate has passed a Bill requiring mandatory labelling of products sold in Australia containing palm oil.  A Senate Committee opposed the Bill observing “almost every argument [in support of mandatory labelling] presented to the committee was countered by alternative evidence from other witnesses.”  The Bill will not make palm oil labelling mandatory.  That will be decided by Australia’s State Governments later in the year.

(New Straits Times) - KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia can still stop Australia from passing a law that will discriminate palm oil, said an Australia-based world trade expert, who feels the move goes against Australian policy. "If the Malaysian government gave the Australian government incentive enough to resist the measure and explained to the state governments of Australia why the proposal was misinformed, the Greens campaign could be defeated," says Alan Oxley who is a former chairman of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (Gatt).

(The Age Editorial by Alan Oxley) - WHAT do animal activists hope to achieve with a ban on exports of live cattle to Indonesia? They think it will pressure Indonesian authorities to introduce humane slaughtering methods. The government's decision to ban exports will increase the price of meat, a staple for Indonesia's poor, by more than one third. The ethical implications of a ban surely warrant attention, as does how Australia wants to be regarded in the Asia-Pacific region - as an empathetic, good neighbour or as an unsympathetic bully.

(Forestry and Poverty Project Newsletter – Issue 23) – The Significance of Indonesia’s Moratorium After many months of delay, Indonesia’s President Yudhyono has signed a law declaring a moratorium on land clearance in Indonesian forests.  Green groups have already attacked the decree, stating that it does not go far enough. The drafting process for the moratorium was subject to considerable government lobbying by Green groups.  Green groups wanted the moratorium to cover primary and secondary forests in Indonesia for an open-ended period.