Indonesia: Gov offers US$190 million for this year’s Community Forestry expansions
The government has allocated Rp 1.9 trillion (US$190 million) this
year for the expansion of community forests across the country.
Forestry Minister Malam Sambat Kaban said in Yogyakarta on Thursday
the government expected to develop forest areas by 400,000 hectares
this year and 2.1 million hectares by 2015. The government fund was
extended under the guise of regional autonomy and also at the request
of local governments. However, many regional government groups appear
unprepared for the program, which the central government has said will
help generate money within communities because of links between
projects and the industrial sector.
“Only two regional governments,
namely Konawe and Simalungun in North Sumatra, are ready to develop
the program so far this year,” Kaban said at the closing of the Forest
and Community Fair. Kaban urged regional governments to soon seize the
opportunity and propose budgets for program. Vice President Jusuf
Kalla launched the program in the Yogyakarta regency of Gunung Kidul
in 2007. Initially, the central government granted 35-year forest
concessions to more than 60 farming collectives in Yogyakarta, West
Nusa Tenggara and Lampung. This year families who live near a forest
can apply for funding to cultivate the area for the community. Kaban
said each family would receive between five and 15 hectares of land on
top of financial assistance. The government hopes the community-forest
areas will supply materials for the forestry industry in the future.
The problem however is that local communities lacked the knowledge
required to support the industry sector in a sustainable manner, Kaban
said.need advocacy and training on forest cultivation. In the forestry
industry, it’s not quantity that matters, but quality.” The Forest and
Community Fair concluded Thursday, with participants including farmers
and representatives of NGOs demanding the government expand community
forest areas to 30 million hectares by 2019. They also encouraged
community-based forest management and rejected a regulation which
treats timber produced by community forests as similar to those cut in
industrial forests.
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