Opinion

Palm oil ban ill-conceived

Published

6 years ago

2020/08/27

Open letter to the President

Whilst appreciating and congratulating Your Excellency on much of the new thrusts proposed in the policy statement, the writer was thoroughly dismayed by your decision to totally ban oil palm cultivation. By contrast, for example, Premier Narendra Modi, two years ago, on the advice of the Technology Commission of India (NITIAayog), decided to expand the cultivation of oil palm in India to 2 billion hectares to meet the national vegetable oil demand, in fact, replacing some low income generating arable crops. Irrigated lands are being used for part of the oil palm cultivations. It would appear that you have not consulted appropriate technocrats and academics in making this vitally important decision. I should kindly urge Your Excellency to also create a similar body as that of India here, a National Policy Commission of experts, to advise on policy matters of national interest.

It would appear that you were driven to this decision largely by the outcry of villagers living in the oil palm cultivation areas of the Southern Province that oil palm is the cause of drying of water bodies in their settlements, and some highly biased so called ‘environmentalists’, who have failed to look at the total picture relating to this highly productive and most profitable oil crop. It is the number one and most widely used global vegetable oil, producing 42% of the global oil demand from only 14.8 million ha as against soybean, the number two, which produces only 29.8%of the global oil demand from 103.8 million ha! Economic benefits of oil palm far outweigh that of coconut, tea and rubber in that comparative annual returns/ha for raw produce being Rs 612,0000, 175,000, 88,000 and 80,000 respectively, as per an estimate made by some scientists.

Misleading CEA report

Unfortunately, a scientifically highly erroneous report produced by the Central Environmental Authority (CEA) on the matter added ‘fuel to the villagers’ fire’! The report has been heavily criticised by the Coconut Research Institute and numerous other independent well-informed scientists. However, the criticisms had little impact on the Yahapalana regime which, having suspended its initial decision to expand the oil palm cultivation to 20,000ha, vacillated for years without generating a final decision!

The CEA supported the contention that oil palm dries up the soil, incorrectly arguing that whereas a rubber tree transpires only 63 litres/day, oil palm transpires 500-600 litres; the oft quoted figures, however, are 1,300 and 1100 mm/year for oil palm and rubber respectively, in the literature, or 120l/rubber tree and 300l/oil palm tree/day. The mean annual rainfall in the wet zone, where both these crops are grown, is as high as 3000 mm, well in excess of the crop requirements! The CEA seems to be unaware that evapo-transpiration rates of crops are calculated on unit area basis and not per tree or plant basis! Whereas the standard tree density of rubber is 520/ha that of oil palm is only 143, implying then that the two crops transpire comparable amounts of water per unit area of land based on our above cited per tree values. Furthermore the reported green water footprint of oil palm, that is the component of water received from precipitation that is stored in the root zone of the soil and is evaporated, transpired or incorporated into plants, is 19,148 cubic metres/ha for oil palm as against 32,410 for rubber.

It is more than evident that over the years, global warming leading to climatic changes as well as increased water use by the increasing population caused this situation. In my own experience, a beautiful stream that ran across my farm in Kandy which I bought in 1992, dried over the years and by 2015 even traces of its existence disappeared! As excessive water consumption is the main argument against oil palm cultivation, it is vital that a hydrological study be conducted, comparing history and current status of water bodies in an exclusively rubber growing area, as against an oil palm areas in the wet zone to convince the concerned parties.

Coming back to the CEA report referred to above, some 12 points had been cited there critical of oil palm, but nearly all of them have been refuted by the CRI, the organization mandated for R & D on oil palm and a host of independent scientists well versed in the science of oil palm. It is unfortunate that you failed to consult them before making the vital decision.

Palm oil and health

Some concern has been expressed over some bi-products formed during palm oil processing supposed to be carcinogenic, but the latest research has established that consuming palm oil in moderation hardly poses a health risk. Whilst some saturated fatty acids in palm oil may be cholesterol elevating, coconut oil it can be argued to be worse in that regard, in that the cholesterol elevating saturated fatty acid content is more. Of course coconut oil has numerous health benefit too, and although it was downgraded as an ‘artery-clogging tropical oil’, several decades ago, it has now become ‘the darling oil of the west’. Further, apart from others, the high (38%) monounsaturated fat content in palm oil has a distinct health benefit, in that it decreases the LDL (bad) cholesterol.

GMOA’s letter

It is ridiculous that the GMOA, which often pokes its nose into matters that it is not thoroughly conversant with, has thanked you for banning oil palm. Have they studied all aspects of the issue: economics, environment and health in-depth before making such utterances? I should refer to an exhaustive review that appeared in an issue of the journal ‘Nutrients’, 2019, on the subject of oil palm by Eva Gestiro and nine co-authors which has discussed the health effects and other matters thoroughly. On a previous occasion too the GMOA had strongly advocated reverting to traditional rice varieties, little realising that they yield only 25-30% of the new improved varieties; and in doing so we will be compelled to import bulk of our rice requirement! Moreover, we have many new rice varieties with similar health and nutritional benefits as the traditional ones, but yielding several fold more!

Alternative lands for oil palm

or other uses

There are some 60,000 ha of uncultivated paddy fields essentially in the wet zone which can be used for other purposes. They are left fallow as returns on investment in rice farming are low. One option is possibly oil palm cultivation, after draining the excess water. In such lands the excess water could be collected in ponds at the bottom of the catena and used for fish culture or irrigation. Raised beds can be prepared, as done for cultivation of coconut in Thailand and Indonesia, in highly ill-drained soils, and used for coconut, oil palm or market gardening. The current provisions of the Agrarian Development Act prohibit alternative use of these lands, but, surely, the Act can be amended.

Coconut oil alternative

It has been suggested by many that we should promote coconut oil as an alternative to palm oil, and the extent under coconut be expanded for the purpose. At the current mean national yield of coconut oil (0.8 M/ha) and the global mean palm oil yield of 3.8-4.0 Mt/ha, we would need five times more land to produce coconut oil than palm oil; and where is the land? With global warming and air temperatures rising, especially in the dry months in the dry zone, there is a serious problem of pollen germination and nut setting in coconut in this area. Hence land expansion for coconut is very limited therein. There is little or no land in the intermediate and wet zones for additional coconut growing. One option, however, appears to be cultivation of coconut as a shade tree for tea in the low and mid countries, and the CRI & TRI research has established that this is feasible. The demand, however, for both virgin and conventional coconut oils appears to have decreased since 2015, whereas that for coconut water is rapidly increasing. In fact the forecast for coconut water demand is to double over the next five years from 2. 25 to 4.5 billion USD. Consequently, the demand for our king coconut is growing, and it would appear more prudent to cultivate king coconut in available lands than producing nuts or oil!

Moving totally to organic farming

Promoting organic farming as far as possible is desirable, but achieving the above target stated in your speech is far- fetched, given the fact that global organic farm cover is increasing only by about 10% of its current extent, which is only 2% of the total global farm cover! Of this 66% is in pastures, and only the balance is in crops! There is much ongoing research in organic farming, especially in the field of microbial fertilizers. However, widely applicable technologies are yet to come. As regards microbial fertilizers, the soil medium should have the nutrients for effective uptake by microbes, implying that the soil should anyway be replenished regularly with nutrients, chemically or organically, except for nitrogen, which legumes and certain other crops can fix from the atmosphere.

So conventional farming cannot be easily replaced. What is more important in the short term is to correct the shortcomings thereof. One important area is judicious use of agrochemicals for which a massive farmer training effort is needed. This necessitates an effective extension service, the current one being in shambles! So please get the government to address this issue. At the same time research and technology output is rapidly declining, mainly because qualified technocrats from research institutes are leaving for greener pastures, especially to the universities where the total remuneration package is more than double for many comparable posts. This lateral brain drain now appears to be more serious than the vertical!

We trust you would give serious consideration to the issues cited above.

Dr PARAKRAMA WAIDYANATHA

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Opinion

U.S. foreign policy double standards and Iran’s Iron theocracy

Published

4 hours ago

2026/03/11

Sahan Weerasooriya

The world’s most theatrical stage

Welcome to the Grand Circus

If global geopolitics were a TV show, it would be cancelled after the first season for being too unbelievable. Consider the plot: the world’s largest arms exporter lectures others about peace; a government that executed over 500 people in a single year tells its citizens it governs by divine law; and international bodies created to enforce rules seem to apply those rules with remarkable … flexibility. Welcome to the real world of international relations, where the rules are made up and the principles don’t matter.

This analysis examines two of the most consequential actors shaping global instability today: the United States of America, a democracy that can’t quite decide whether it believes in democracy, and the Islamic Republic of Iran, a theocracy that has perfected the art of punishing its own people for simply existing.

Episode I: The United States, ‘Do as I Say, Not as I Do’

The Democracy Export Business

The United States has, for decades, positioned itself as the global guardian of democracy, freedom, and human rights. It is a noble brand. The marketing budget alone, in the form of military expenditure at $886 billion in 2023, is staggering. And yet, the product being sold and the product being delivered have often been … different things.

The CIA-backed coup of 1953, codenamed Operation Ajax, removed Iran’s democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh and reinstated the autocratic Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, primarily to protect Anglo-American oil interests.

Nuclear Exceptionalism: The World’s Worst-Kept Secret

The United States currently holds approximately 5,044–5,177 nuclear warheads (depending on the source and year), while Russia being the largest with a stockpile estimated at approximately 5,580 warheads. yet it leads international campaigns demanding that other nations not develop nuclear weapons. This is a bit like the world’s most heavily armed person standing at the door of a gun shop, telling customers they cannot purchase firearms.

Furthermore, Israel is widely believed to possess 80–90 nuclear warheads. The United States has never imposed sanctions on Israel for this. India and Pakistan, both outside the NPT, were rewarded with nuclear cooperation deals after the tested nuclear weapons.

The Saudi Arabia Paradox

Perhaps, no relationship illustrates U.S. foreign policy hypocrisy more vividly than Washington’s alliance with Saudi Arabia. The Kingdom is an absolute monarchy with no elections, no free press, where women were legally barred from driving until 2018, and where the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, carried out, according to U.S. intelligence, on orders from Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, resulted in … arms sales continuing and diplomatic ties intact.

The United States sold Saudi Arabia over $37 billion in arms between 2015 and 2020, weapons used in a Yemen war that the United Nations described as one of the world’s worst humanitarian catastrophes. Yet the U.S. simultaneously held press conferences about human rights. The cognitive dissonance is not a bug. It is the feature.

Iraq: The Weapons of Mass Distraction

In 2003, the United States invaded Iraq on the basis of alleged weapons of mass destruction (WMD) that did not exist. The invasion resulted in an estimated 150,000–1,000,000 Iraqi civilian deaths depending on methodology, the displacement of millions, the destabilization of an entire region, and the rise of the Islamic State, none of which appeared in the original brochure. The officials responsible for this foreign policy catastrophe faced no international tribunal. No sanctions were imposed on the United States. Several architects of the war are today respected media commentators.

Meanwhile, the International Criminal Court (ICC), an institution the United States has never ratified, is expected to hold others to account for far lesser offenses. As of 2024, the U.S. has actively sanctioned ICC officials who attempted to investigate American personnel for potential war crimes in Afghanistan.

Episode II: Iran, The People’s Nightmare

Iran’s political system is built on the concept of Velayat-e Faqih, the Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist, a political-theological doctrine holding that a senior Islamic cleric should govern society. In practice, this means that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, unelected by the general public, holds veto power over all branches of government, controls the military, the judiciary, state media, and the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

The elected president, whether ‘moderate’ or ‘hardliner’, operates within a system where real power resides with the Supreme Leader and an unelected Guardian Council that vets all candidates and can disqualify anyone it deems insufficiently Islamic. In the 2021 presidential election, the Guardian Council disqualified over 590 candidates out of 592 who applied. The word ‘election’ is being used loosely here.

Women’s Rights: A Systematic Dismantling

Since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Iranian women have endured one of the most comprehensive rollbacks of rights in modern history. Within weeks of the revolution, mandatory hijab laws were imposed, women were barred from serving as judges, and the minimum marriage age for girls was reduced to 9 years (later revised to 13 in 1982). This was not incidental policy; it was ideological architecture.

Today, Iranian women face legal discrimination across virtually every domain. Under the Iranian Civil Code, a woman’s testimony in court counts as half that of a man’s. Women cannot travel abroad without the written permission of their husband or male guardian. Married women cannot work without spousal consent in many circumstances. The diyeh (blood money) for a woman’s life is legally valued at half that of a man.

In September 2022, 22-year-old Mahsa (Zhina) Amini died in the custody of Iran’s Morality Police, after being arrested for allegedly wearing her hijab improperly. Her death triggered the Woman, Life, Freedom uprising, one of the largest protest movements in Iranian history. The government’s response was to kill over 500 protesters, arrest more than 19,000, and execute at least four people in connection with the protests by early 2023.

The IRGC and State-Sponsored Repression

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is a military-economic-political entity unlike any other in the region. It controls an estimated 20–40% of Iran’s economy through businesses, construction contracts, and import monopolies. It commands proxy militias across Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen. And it suppresses domestic dissent with a ruthlessness that has drawn consistent condemnation from United Nations human rights bodies.

Amnesty International’s 2022-2023 annual report documented the IRGC and security forces using live ammunition, birdshot, and metal pellets against protesters, deliberately targeting eyes, resulting in hundreds being blinded. The UN Special Rapporteur on Iran documented ‘serious, widespread and systematic human rights violations’ constituting potential crimes against humanity.

Episode III: Where the Two Hypocrisies Meet

The relationship between the United States and Iran is, in many ways, a story of two entities who deserve each other in the sense that the behavUior of each government has fed the domestic narrative of the other for decades.

Washington uses Iran as justification for its military presence in the Gulf, its arms sales to autocratic Gulf states, and its general posture as indispensable regional hegemon. Tehran uses American hostility and sanctions as justification for economic failure, political repression, and nuclear advancement. Both governments’ hard-liners need each other to remain in power.

The Iranian people, 85 million of them, majority under 35, highly educated, and overwhelmingly wanting engagement with the world, are trapped between a government that treats them as subjects and an international sanctions regime that punishes them for their government’s choices. The American people, meanwhile, continue paying for a foreign policy architecture that serves arms manufacturers, defense contractors, and geopolitical abstractions more than it serves democratic values or human security.

Some Uncomfortable Truths

The United States is not the villain of every story, nor is Iran irredeemably authoritarian in the hearts of its people. What is consistent, and what this analysis has documented, is that both governments operate by standards they refuse to apply to themselves.

Tehran’s theocratic governance has failed its population economically, politically, and most visibly in its treatment of women and dissidents. The Woman, Life, Freedom movement showed the world what Iranian society wants. The government’s violent response showed the world what the Islamic Republic fears.

The lesson, uncomfortable as it is, is that powerful states, whether wielding aircraft carriers or theology, tend to exempt themselves from the rules they want others to follow. The only antidote is an informed public that refuses to accept these double standards as the natural order of things. Read critically. Follow the money. And remember: when a government tells you it acts in the name of God or democracy.

(The writer, a senior Chartered Accountant and professional banker, is Professor at SLIIT, Malabe. The views and opinions expressed in this article are personal.)

Opinion

SLC Grants to clubs and associations under scrutiny

Published

4 hours ago

2026/03/11

Sahan Weerasooriya

The scale and manner of grant distributions underscore the urgent need to rectify the weaknesses identified by the Auditor General. Remarkably, the accounts for the years 2024 and 2025 are still not published and only the 2023 accounts are available for public scrutiny.

Grants to clubs and associations increased from LKR 1.30 billion in the prior year to LKR 2.46 billion in 2023, representing an escalation of over LKR 1.15 billion year-on-year. These grants were distributed among 36 recipient clubs and associations, with individual allocations ranging from approximately LKR 1.5 million to almost LKR 300 million. Such wide variation and substantial growth warrant clear public disclosure of the allocation framework, the approval processes, and the beneficiary criteria.

While it is understandable that higher profitability enables greater financial support to clubs, the absence of a transparent, rule-based grant policy gives rise to governance concerns, and unless properly explained, leaves room for malicious or unfounded allegations that grant allocations may be used to influence voting behaviour or entrench existing officials. Robust disclosure and effective oversight are therefore essential to safeguard institutional credibility. The precise immediate need for high funding and their monitoring processes need to be divulged.

A case in point is Colombo Cricket Club (CCC), which received LKR 279,531,827 in 2023, making it the highest individual club recipient. As disclosed under the related-party notes to the financial statements, the President of Sri Lanka Cricket is also the President of Colombo Cricket Club, resulting in this transaction being classified as a related-party transaction.

In contrast to several grant recipient entities reporting profits, Sri Lanka Cricket recorded a deficit of approximately Rs. 2 billion in its Statement of Financial Performance for 2023.

It is also noteworthy from the cash flow statement that cash and fund balances declined sharply, from approximately LKR 10.8 billion in the previous year to around LKR 5.6 billion in 2023, representing a significant depletion of liquid resources within a single financial year.

A more meaningful and complete evaluation of these developments—particularly the position of funds available as at 31 December 2024 and 31 December 2025—will only be possible once the financial statements for 2024 and 2025 are released and subjected to public scrutiny.

A cricket enthusiast – Moratuwa

Opinion

Microfinance and Credit Regulatory Authority Act 2026 fails all affacted communities

Published

1 day ago

2026/03/10

Sahan Weerasooriya

A protest against exploitation by microfinance companies

The Microfinance and Credit Regulatory Authority Bill was passed into law by the Parliament of Sri Lanka on 4 March. According to Deputy Minister of Finance and Planning Dr. Anil Jayantha, the main object of the Act is to establish an Authority to “license and supervise the under-regulated microfinance and moneylending sector, aiming to protect borrowers from exploitation and ensure financial stability”.

However, the Yukthi Collective is saddened and disappointed that a government which pledged to take “measures to alleviate the burden of predatory microfinance loans with high interest rates on women” (NPP Manifesto, 2024: Page no. 44), will now add to their unbearable weight.

The new Act, as virtually all legislation enacted by Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s government, is a legacy of the anti-working class Ranil Wickremesinghe regime. It evades the root causes of the microfinance trap, and ignores debt justice for women borrowers.

It fails in understanding the connections between household debt and public debt. The vicious cycle of national debt is sustained by lack of growth in economic activity because of poor access to affordable credit.

It fails to make equal representation of women mandatory in the new Authority. If representatives of women borrowers and their self-run organisations are not present in the regulatory body, how will its members know of their lived experiences and make decisions that value women’s unpaid and paid contributions to sustaining life?

System Change

Millions of indebted households voted for the NPP with hope and expectation of ‘system change’. But instead of honouring its manifesto promise to them, the government has let them down in the law-making process; as well as the focus and substance of the new Act.

It is appalling that NPP parliamentarians, including some of its women members, appear not to have read and understood the bill they enacted into law, nor spoke to the rural credit community providers in their electorates for their views.

Predatory lending exists in the formal and informal sectors. Within this ecosystem, the Act fails to understand, identify, and prohibit predatory lending and recovery practices. It is a cover for the Central Bank’s failure to properly regulate ‘Licensed Finance Companies’ in the interests of citizens.

The biggest offenders are the big finance companies, in which some parliamentarians are deposit-holders. Therefore, some lawmakers benefit from excess profitmaking through exploitative practices, at the expense of poor mostly rural women.

Where law reform should discipline the bullies and thugs in credit delivery, it will instead wipe out, through over-regulation, community-based and managed lenders such as death donation societies, farmer associations, and urban and rural women’s collectives, which have been a lifeline for vulnerable working-class women and a defence from harmful recovery practices.

Structural Adjustment Programmes

The motivation for this new law are the market- and capital- friendly structural reforms insisted by International Financial Institutions; not the concerns and needs of those at the mercy of predatory lenders.

From the Microfinance Act 2016, to the 2023 version of the Ranil Wickremesinghe regime, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) through its loans has been a promoter of these regressive reforms.

The 2026 Act, with some changes suggested by the Supreme Court in 2024 and hardly any of the changes demanded by affected communities, has been moved forward by the NPP government in line with ADB loan conditionalities.

The path of de-regulation for banking, finance, trade, and investment; and over-regulation of poor people’s savings and credit institutions, smacks of the bias to big capital, which the NPP in opposition once criticised.

Reforms needed

The financial and banking reforms we want to see are to make credit from state banks and public funds accessible and affordable to women producers in agriculture and micro and small business operators; with decent wages and social protection for workers; that improve household opportunity for a dignified livelihood and decent lives.

Yukthi is a forum supporting working people’s movements and people’s struggles for democracy and justice in Sri Lanka.

by Yukthi Collective