My Field Work Report
This is my field work report during accompanying Prof. Stein Kristianses doing research in four different places: Lombok, Ambon, Seram and Manggarai. This research aims for preparing Indonesia as a piloting country on REDD project in the year of 2012.
I. The Rinjani forest, Lombok
An Interview with the Head of WWF Office in Lombok on 16th of October 2008
1. Introduction
Lombok is a small island in Nusa Tenggara Barat province with 3 million inhabitants. One of the tourism places in Lombok is National park of Rinjani. This national park is protected by the local government not only because of its tourism potentials, but also its contributions to the life of Lombok people. Actually, the mountain of Rinjani and its surrounding forests are like ‘a heart of Lombok Island’, producing fresh air and clean water for its resident. The question now is if the government and the residents really take care of it.
2. Rinjani National Park and its problems
The size of Rinjani National Park is 125.000 ha. According to the head of the WWF office in Mataram, the forests cover 60.000 ha of the park area. There is a substantial deforestation within the park, however, mainly caused by illegal loggers. The question is who the illegal loggers are. The head of WWF of Lombok expounded that illegal loggers are 600.000 people living around the National Park of Rinjani. Many people living around Rinjani depend on Rinjani forests for firewood or timber. They cut down the trees for defending their economic life.
Besides, the illegal loggers are also from outside of the people living around the forest, from the south. They come to the north of Lombok and log the forests around Rinjani. But, it is a little bit strange because people living around the forest do not prohibit south logger. Maybe, it happens because of the ownership of the forest land is local government not local people living around the forest. It means that people living there perceive that they have no privilege of Rinjani. That is why; they let the south logger to cut down the trees at National Park of Rinjani. Or, there is another possibility; they do not prohibit the south illegal logger because they are illegal loggers too.
Why are the illegal loggers really obstinate in logging the forest in Lombok? The head of WWF admitted that most of illegal loggers are poor. And poverty forces them to log the forest in Lombok. It is the reason why Lombok people become really obstinate in logging the forest. But this reason is not enough because people who are poor not automatically log the forest. There is some reason of illegal logging in Lombok.
First, the head of WWF office said that Lombok always faces deficit of timber 800 cubic per year. It means that Lombok still produces its own timber but it is limited. The need of timber in Lombok is quite high. That is why; people of Lombok really want to be an illegal logger even it is dangerous because they realize that they will get money easily by doing deforestation. Their business will develop rapidly.
Second, businessman becomes intellectual actor of deforestation in Lombok. The head of WWF Lombok admited that the intellectual actor of deforestation in lombok is businessman. They are the one who buy the illegal timbers. Or, they are the one who give money for illegal logger to cut down the trees. That is why, if forest police and local government only catch people who cut down the forest, the forestation in Lombok will not be stopped because the businessman will ask or look for the other people to log the forest for running his or her business.
Third, local people living around the forest do not support government program in monitoring the forest. The head of WWF said that people just keep quiet if the forest police or the government asks them about deforestation. Or, they will inform to illegal loggers in advance by mobile phone or other means about the coming of forest polices doing monitoring of forest area. Therefore, it is difficult to catch illegal loggers: the day of forest police monitoring is a day off for illegal loggers.
3. The local government and its alternative solution regarding deforestation in Lombok
According to the head of the WWF office, the local government really concerns with its forest in Lombok. The proof of the concern is that local government prohibits whoever to cut down trees in National Park of Rinjani and 1/3 productive area of forest in Lombok and initiates to import timber from outside of Lombok. Its concern shows us that local government really realizes the substantial function of forest. Besides that, local government has also made perda on forestation. This perda obligates downstream societies to pay a monthly amount of money to upstream societies in order to take care of the forest and avoid logging. That money is used for maintaining the forest. Forests should be taken care of so that the debit of water remains the same or can be increased from time to time. This is the main purpose of this perda, not to reduce the global warming like the program of REDD but to keep the quality and the quantity of the water.
But the further question is how the local government distributes the money of the downstream society. Is the money given directly to the upstream societies? Does every upstream family receive that money every month? The head of WWF said that the money collected from downstream societies is not given directly to the people. Upstream societies could ask for money by presenting a proposal to the local government if they need like to build POLINDES, POSTU and fulfill other public needs.
But the way of money distribution as explained above is not effective in reducing or eliminating illegal logging cases. In fact, the aim of collecting money is to prevent illegal logging of the forest area so that the quality and quantity of water are kept well every time. If upstream people who really depend on their life on forest do not get money of downstream directly to fulfill their daily needs, they will automatically log the forest for defending their life. Therefore, the mechanism and the substance of this perda should be improved by local government and its society.
II. Maluku Tengah and the Pulau Seram Forests
1) Interview with the Head of the District Department of Forestry in Masohi, 20th October 2008
This is The Table of the Size of the Forest of Maluku Tengah Regency (Ha)
Regency Conservation Forest Limited Productive Forest Permanent Productive Forest Conversion Productive Forest National Park Wild-Life Preservation And Tourism The Area Of Other Using Of Land Total
Maluku Tengah 137,584.00 180,789 33,331 130,250 189,000 14,234 61,283 746,471.00
137,584.00 180,789 33,331 130,250 189,000 14,234 61,283 746,471.00
- Introduction
Seram Island is a quite big compared to Ambon. The condition and the people are more less the same. But the air may be quite different. Talking about the air, Seram is better than Ambon because Seram is not polluted yet. And the other reason is Seram has a wide forest. If we are traveling by a ship, we can enjoy the beautiful view of the forest of Seram. Almost all the lands of Seram Island are covered by forests.
When we met the head of forestry department in Masohi, he affirmed that Seram has a wide forest. And this wide forest is still in a good control of the local government. There is very few forest was destroyed only.
- How are the Maluku Tengah forests?
Seram Island has 3 regencies. Maluku Tengah has 746.471 ha of forest. Its size is quite big and can be a very good asset for Regency of Maluku Tengah.
According to the head of forestry department, the condition of his forest is really good. This is because of good monitoring by the forestry department and the police. The forestry department can work optimally with limited facilities and 85 employees. Out of 85 employees, 55 employees are working at the central office and the rest, 30, are working in the field.
In Maluku Tengah, according head of forest department, there is no illegal logging. But, if illegal logging cases exists, it is very few. Some local people cut down the forest, but it happens only in a small scale. Local people who cut down the trees only use hand saws. That is why, he said, one tree for one month. It means that the impact of logging timber like this is not really damaging the existence of the forest.
Besides that, in Maluku Tengah, the productive forest has never been logged, even by the government. This is so because there is no mini-HPH in Maluku Tengah. The size of productive forest is 344.000 ha. Maybe, in the future, government will allow mini-HPH in Maluku Tengah.
Why is there no mini-HPH in Maluku Tengah, which has the large productive forest area? According to the head of forestry department, it happens because no businessmen have been interested in operating logging concessions in the district. He said, maybe, there will be HPH in Maluku Tengah later because some businessmen have already given a proposal to the central government for utilizing the productive forest of Maluku Tengah. If this proposal will be approved by the central government, it means that mini HPH will be immediately opened in Maluku Tengah.
But personally, the head of forestry department does not agree with the presence of HPH in Maluku Tengah. There are some reasons of his disagreement. Firstly, the presence of HPH in Maluku will destroy the existence of the forest. Secondly, the income of the presence of HPH will go to the central government. Local government gets nothing. Thirdly, if the presence of HPH causes deforestation in Maluku Tengah, he will be blamed by local and central government because he is the in charge of the existence of the forest.
He said the Indonesian government does not have a consistent policy regarding the issue of saving the forest. On one side, the government claims to stop all illegal logging and save our beloved forest. But on the other side, the government by the presence of HPH and mini-HPH allows the businessmen to log the forest. He said the policy of the Indonesian government regarding the safety of the forest is contradictive in itself.
Talking about the forest borders, he said that borders in Seram in general and in Maluku Tengah in particular are quite problematic. Some local people are still relaying on the Netherland forest borders. They do not know or admit the new forest border of the Indonesian government. That is why they cut down the forests owned by the government. Besides, these unclear forest borders have been causing horizontal conflicts between different communities of the local people.
He mentioned some reasons why illegal logging in Maluku Tengah is really small. Firstly, local government really takes care of its forest. The police and forestry department have really committed themselves to looking after the forest. Secondly, local people have their own forests. According to the data, in Maluku Tengah there are 61.283 ha of forest which is called “the area of other using”. And the private forest is included in this category. He said that if local people log their own forest, it is not recognized as illegal logging because the UU insists that illegal loggers are people who log the timber inside the government forests only. But before logging their own forest, local people should ask permission to the forestry department, bringing with its requirements like certification of the land and the others.
III. Local People and Local government Role and Their role for Taking Care the Forest
3.1. Local People
Local people in Maluku Tengah really concern with their own forest. The concern of the forest is shown by willingness of the people to take care the forest from all kinds of exploitations.
In local level, there is local informal institution which is built for keeping the safety of the forest. This local informal institution is called “Kewang”. The head of the Kewang is chosen by the Kepala Desa (the head of the district). Actually, the head of the Kewang is a strongest man in the Village so that he could keep the existence of the forest.
This local informal institution will give punishment for the people logging the forest by sticking the illegal logger. And this kind of local informal institution still exists until now.
3.2. Local government
The proof of the good concern of local government is that local government does good monitoring of its forest so that illegal logging could be avoided. And, therefore, the head of forestry department firmly believes that there is no any illegal logging in Maluku Tengah.
According to the head of forestry department, local government in general and forest department in particular as a pioneer of keeping the forest existence have difficulties in the field regarding monitoring of the forest. Those difficulties are caused by lack of forest facilities like cars and boats. He said they, forestry department, already gave their proposals to the central government regarding the forest facilities, but the realization of those proposals are nothing until now.
Finally, at the end of the interview, he hoped that the future of the Maluku Tengah forest should be more paid attention by the central government by producing of better policy of the forestry and by providing good forest facilities for the field employees. And he entrusted his hoping to Stein so as to deliver to the central government. And he was so grateful and agreed with the presence of the REDD program which is expounded by Stein, even it is a little bit late. Many forests have been destroying, and the REDDY has just come. Though, he said even it is late, we should do something for our forests rather than do nothing.
- The National Park of Manusela: Interview with the Head of the office,
21st October 2008
This is the table of National Park of Manusela
No The Category of National Park forest Size (Ha) %
1 Primary forest 128.853 68,18
2 Secondary forest 12.702 6,72
3 Estate/farming land/rice field 4.268 2,26
4 Bushes 4.531 2,40
5 Open land (lahan kosong) 669 0,35
6 Village 291 0,15
7 Mangrove 3.954 2,09
8 the others (lain-lain) 1.801 0,95
9 The area of river system 31.931 16,89
Total 189.000 100
- Introduction
National park of Manusela is a conservation area with its size 189.000 ha (SK Menhut No.281/kpts-VI/1997) which located in Maluku Tengah Regency-Maluku province. It is very beautiful and should be very nice place for tourism. But, unfortunately, this national park is rare visiting by both domestic and foreigner tourist. According to the head of national park office based on the data of 2007, the foreigner visitors of national park are only 97 people. But, he said that the amount of visitors should be more than 97 people because some of visitors did not report themselves before going inside of national park.
The national park of Manusela has quite big forest, and it is dominated by primary forest. But the existence of the national park is threatened especially by the local people living around the forest border of national park. Besides, the other threat is from the government itself. HPH will be built, and the department of mining indicated that under the national park there are mining materials which is should be explored. But, anyway, the head of national park is still defending the existence of national park because he realizes that its existence is really important for the life of human being in general and especially for people of Maluku Tengah regency.
- National Park and Its Problem
The National park of Manusela is decided by Forestry Minister as a national park in 1997. But the conservation of its existence is still not optimal. It happens because of some reasons. Firstly, unclear forest border of national park of Manuseal has caused a problematic challenge for its conservation. Local people easily go inside of the national park opening new field or new farming land. They do not know about the forest border. And the head of the national park said that most of border marks were destroyed when the conflict in 1999 was broken in Ambon and Seram. The loss of border marks makes the border of national park unclear and problematic so that local people easily go inside of national park of Manusela. Most of the land that local people used to use for opening a new field is forestless. This land is ex-HPH land which operated in Maluku Tengah in 1982-1988. And HPH, according to him, will be reopened, and it will be a challenge for his office to defense the existence of national park.
Secondly, most of local people are not aware yet about the function of the forest existence especially the existence of the national park of Manusela. It happens because of easy going mentality of uneducated people living around the national park of Manusela. Besides that most of people living there are poor farmers. That is why; they really rely on forest potentiality to defense their life even by cutting down the forest at the national park of Manusela. Or, local people living there claimed that the forest is owned by them. They already got inherently the forest from their ancestors. This sometimes raises a problem in keeping the national park.
Thirdly, lack of forestry equipments like car, motor bike and the others causes his employees do not work efficiently especially in monitoring the national park.
Fourthly, there is a lack of employees. In his office, he said there are 79 employees. Half is working at the office with the administration and the rest is in the field. But, the amounts of the employees are not enough. To solve this problem, the office uses 60 local people to be employees in the field for keeping the safety of the national park. These 60 local people are called PAM Swakarsa. They are paid monthly by the office.
Talking about the illegal logging, he said that there are illegal logging cases at national park but in a small scale only. Why is only in a small scale? It happens because of the small amount of people living around the national park forest border. Actually, there are some villages which are closed to the forest border. They, sometimes, do illegal logging but in small scale only.
Are there any alternative incomes from the national park of Manusela instead of cutting down the forest? He said there are a lot of alternative incomes could be taken from national park of Manusela. Therefore, they are still planning to empower the local people so as to utilize this alternative income of the forest. He mentioned some kinds of the empowerment that they already did and still in planning. These are some kinds of empowerment:
1. The office already distributed the seed of cacao and myristica fragrans (pala) to local people so as to plant in their field. Hopefully, they will get more income from these kinds of plant.
2. The office is still planning to teach people to run business on butterfly farm.
3. The office suggested people to get more income by getting resin from national park forest. It is not dangerous because people only cut the bark of the trees for getting sap.
4. The office is planning to teach people how to open orchid farm. They can get orchid from inside of the national park of Manusela and extend outside of Manusela. It can be a good commodity for gaining the income of the family.
5. The office will teach people how to plant and look after a kind of tree, namely calophyllum inophyllum. This kind of tree can be good commodity.
6. People are suggested to plant aleurites moluccana, durian and the other plants so that they could increase their income. They could get durian and other plants inside of the national park.
7. The office wants to promote national Manusela so as to attract both domestic and foreigner tourist. If many tourists come to national park of Manusela, people have chance in running business in handicraft, hotel and cottage. Besides, local people can be a tourist guide. It can be an alternative income of the national park of Manusela for the local people living around the park.
And at the end of the interview, the head of national park office hoped that the research of Stein could reduce the challenges of keeping the forest. At least, the result of research can raise the awareness of the local people to take care their forest. Besides that he hoped that Stein can help them how to get the forest facilities. By the good facilities, they will work better in monitoring the existence of the Manusela forest.
About, the REDD program, the head of national park really supported. He said that by the program of buying carbon dioxide he will work harder to maintain Manusela forest so that they could sell carbon dioxide for the welfare of local government in general and local people living around the forest in particular.
Saka Village and the National Park of Manusela, An interview with the Secretary of Desa Saka on 22nd October 2008
I. Introduction
Saka is a local village which is not far away from the national park of Manusela. Saka is a village included in the ownership of Horale (Pertuanan Horale). Horale ever experienced land conflict with its neighbor village Soleman. The conflict broke when Soleman people claimed that the land of Horale people as their land. Horale people said that Soleman people are many but they have small farming land. And Horale people are small but they have big farming land. This is the reason why Soleman people want to take the land of its neighbor village, Horale.
Further, Horale people in Saka said that this problem was also caused by the local government. Local government had an empowerment program by distributing teak trees to Soleman people. And Soleman people planted those teak trees on the land of Horale People. Soleman people already knew that that land is owned by Horale but they still planted teak trees. But even this conflict have been lasting for 2 years, local government does not solve this conflict yet.
II. National Park of Manusela and Saka People
National park of Manusela is not far away from Desa Saka. According to the local village, desa Saka is around 8 kilometers from the national park forest border. Even the distance is really close but Saka people do not log the national forest.
According to the secretary of the desa Saka, people of Saka never logged the national park forest. It happens because the national park forest polices always do monitoring 3 times in a month and socialize about the forest border to the local people, and ask them not to cut down the forest and not to open farming land inside the national park. Therefore, most of Saka people already knew about the national forest border. But, before knowing the forest border of national park, people of Saka went inside of national park and logged many kinds of trees like linggua, desi and the others for both selling and building a new house. According to him, only people of Soleman who went inside the national forest even they know it is prohibited by the government. That is way; the existence of the national park is threatened.
He said people in Saka, log their own forest. Desa Saka itself has its own forest. This community forest is logged and then sold by the desa institution. The money of selling this timber will totally go to the desa. Besides that local people also have their own forest. In Saka, there are 14 clans, and every clan has its own forest. Every family could cut its own forest both for selling and building a new house. The head of clan will distribute to every family of his people regarding customary forest. But, if local people want to cut down their forest and bring outside of Saka, they should have permit letter from the head of desa otherwise they will be caught by the police on the way of bringing outside of Saka.
Further, he said that the existence of the national park is threatened by irresponsibly people. The other local people are not afraid of going inside of Manusela Park and log the timbers there. Besides that he said there is a military running business on timber. His name is Labiru. He has 14 chain saws operate in the forest. Local people are afraid of this military because of his uniforms. Therefore, local people just keep quiet when seeing his employees are logging inside the government forest.
Most of Saka people are poor. The majority of people are farmer and some of them are fisherman. Most of them only have elementary school degree. The main income of the Saka people is from cacao, banana and coconut. But the income is up and down depending on the harvest. Though, even they are poor, they do not log the government forest for fulfilling their daily need.
Actually, there are some alternative incomes from the forest which could gain their income. These alternative incomes are rattan, resin and conarium commune. But, most of Saka people do not know how to utilize these alternative incomes. Besides that there is no buyer for these alternative incomes especially for rattan. But for other commodities like cacao, coconut and banana, there are many buyers. The buyers usually came to the desa. That is why; local people here do not need to go to Masohi for selling their commodities.
Talking about the empowerment, people in Saka sometimes got assistance of local government. The organization of house wife (PKK) ever got fund for making coconut oil. But, the fund was already stopped. Besides, this desa was ever given a boat and a chain saw from Social Department. But, according to the secretary of desa Saka, this empowerment of local government is not enough for eliminating poverty in this village.
Sawai Vilage and the National Park of Manusela: An interview with the Secretary of Desa Sawai on 22nd October 2006
I. Introduction
Sawai is a north village of Seram Island which almost touches the border of national park of Manusela. Actually, Sawai is one of the oldest villages in Seram. According to the history, long time ago, Sawai is one of the small king in Seram and Netherland admitted the existence of this king by giving a gold stick to the king of Sawai.
II. Sawai, its forest and National Park of Manusela
Sawai has 800 families and 4.100 people. Most of people work as farmer, fisherman, craftsman and trader. They are living in a very peaceful village even they said that they are poor. But their income by harvesting their farming plant and other works like fishing is quite big. And it justifies that they are not really poor. Even some of their children are still studying at the university. Their income is from vanilla, copra, clove, durian, cacao, and fishing.
Do Sawai people log the government forest even they have enough income for their daily need? According to the secretary of desa Sawai, people of Sawai do not log the government forest like at the national park of Manusela. It happens because of the strict control and monitoring of forest polices. He said Sawai people ever logged the national park forest but only in the year of 1970. Since 1986, they did not log the government forest anymore now.
But, some of Sawai villagers have their own chain saw more than 20 chain saws. They use these chain saws for logging the government forest because their private forest is already getting lesser. But, according to the secretary, Sawai people do not use chain saws for logging the government forest. They use chain saws for cut down their private forest. In Sawai, people have their own forest land. That is why; they have an authority to cut down their forest but should be with the permission of the head of desa. Mostly, the customary forest land does not have the land certificate. And the border between customary forest land and government forest is not so clear. Therefore, it causes the problem of keeping the forest.
Secretary of desa Sawai also said that there are some villagers who log the government forest but in a small scale only. It is a threat. That is why; there are some local people chosen by the head of desa as a response of the request of the national park of Manusela to be forest guardians. And the national park of Manusela office will pay around Rp. 500.000, 00 per year. And he said, the government forest is not threaten by local people only but also by military and police. Recently, 5 militaries were caught and brought to the jail. They were running the business on timber by logging inside the government forest.
Talking about society empowerment, according to the secretary, Sawai gets many empowerment programs from government. These are the programs:
1. Sawai has IDT program. It means that some of Sawai people are poor. That is why; this program has aims to reduce and even eliminating poverty.
2. There is empowerment program done by local animals department. The department of animals gives cows and goats to people.
3. There is empowerment program from agriculture department by giving seeds of cacao and hybrid coconut.
But he said sometimes the program is not suitable with the need of the local people. For instance, a family is farmer and they are given fish net as an assistance of empowerment program from local government. It is not suitable with the background of this family. This family will sell this fish net for another fisherman later. It happens because no cooperation between local government and the desa government. Government gives the program directly without including desa government. Further, he said if by the time of regent representative election, people will get many empowerment programs. It happens because behind the empowerment program, there are politic interests of certain people.
Chain saws Men and Their Work: An Interview with 2 Chain saw Men on 23rd of October 2008 in Sawai
I. Introduction
There are two chain saw men. They have been working as a chain saw man 20 and 15 years. According to them, to be a chain saw man is very difficult because there are many risks like caught by the police and military and pressed by the timber. But, to be chain saw man will get much money. The income of chain saw man is around 7-10 million per month. Because of this big income they are motivated to be a chain saw man.
II. Chain saw men and their work
1. The first chain saw man.
“To be a chain saw man is a choice of life. I am poor; therefore I will defense our life by logging the trees. I log our own forest and also I am paid by other people to log their timber. Whoever asks me to log their timber even inside the forest of national park of Manusela, I will do it. I do like that because I need money, and without money my family will eat nothing”. This is the statement of a chain saw man.
“I ever went inside the national park more then 20 times for logging the forest there. I did that because I was asked by the business man or by local people. And I thought that I will not be caught by the police because I am here by other people to log the trees. The police will catch people paying me. But, if the business men are police, military or national park employees; they will not be caught even logging inside the Nationalm Park.
He ever experienced that he was almost beaten and caught by a military. But, after the businessman who asked him to cut the trees at the national park gave a sum of money, he could continue log the forest. At that time, they gave money around Rp. 500.000. He said that they are not afraid of cutting down the trees in government forest if they already have a sum of money for bribing the police or military.
He said more 20 illegal loggers inside the national park logging the forest of national park everyday. And most of them are working for businessman running on timber. Most of businessmen are police and military. In Seram, most of timber businessmen are police and military. He said the business of timber will get much money. But, sometimes these businessmen ever cheated chain saws men. They took the timber without paying any money for him and the other chain saw man.
2. The second chain saw man
He has been working as chain saw man for 15 years. He uses his chain saw for cut his own timber and the other timber. And sometimes he logs the forest of national park of Manusela.
He went and logged inside to national park not because of unclear forest border. He already fully knew the forest border of national park, but because of economic pressure he did like that. He said he never be caught by the police or military. It happens because of some reason.
1. The national park is really big. Therefore, if the polices are in one side of the forest, they will log in the other side. He said the forest polices are limited, and it is impossible, they could take care the whole national park.
2. Most of the businessmen of timber are police and military. That is why; the safety of the chain saw man is ok. They will not be caught even logging in the government forest.
3. Illegal loggers could bribe forest police.
He said there are more than 20 chain saw men in national park per day. Most of chain saw men who still operating in the government forest never caught by the police. That is why; they are not discouraged yet. But most of chain saw men who ever caught by the police are discouraged of logging government forest.
He said it is difficult to reduce forest degradation in Seram even the forest police are really strict in monitoring the forest. Illegal loggers are cleverer than the police. And to be a chain saw man is a work of illegal logger only. Therefore, if government wants to reduce the forest degradation in Seram, government should create a new job for illegal logger like him.
For instance, he is a chain man now. But, he wants to change his job because to be a chain saw man is very difficult. He wants to be a fisherman. That is why; if government gives him a good fish net, he will leave his job as a chain saw man.
Forest Guardian of the National Park of Manusela: An Interview with Forest Guardian of National Park of Manusela on 23rd of October 2008 in Sawai
He has been forest guardian of national park of Manusela for 5 years. But in this last 4 months, he did not work his duty as forest guardian because they do not have Kepala Desa yet. Actually, Kepala desa commands and controls them to work as forest guardian.
There are 4 forest guardian of desa Sawai. They were chosen by the Kepala desa as the response of the request of national park office. And they will be paid by the national park Rp. 1.000.000, 00 per year. But this payment has a realization in 2003 only. From 2004-2008, they were not paid anymore. But, they are still working because kepala desa asks them to work. Kepala desa asks them because they are also employees of desa Sawai.
They work 5 days per week, Friday and Sunday are day off. Out of 4 people, they divided into 2 groups. Each group will work for a week and then changed by other group. They work from 8 a.m-5p.a.
Since he had been a forest guardian, he already caught local people who logged national park of Manusela 3 times. But he did not bring them to the jail. He only asked, what for do you log the government forest? Most of them said that we want to build a new house. Then, he said, it is ok. After finishing this last tree, you have to stop. And he started to explain to them about the existence of the national park.
And, he said he ever met police and military and their employees who were logging the national park forest. But, he just kept quite. He was afraid of beating by the police or military. His friends ever experienced of being beaten by the military when prohibiting a police and his employees not to cut the national forest.
He said forest police now is quite strict. They do monitoring 1-3 times per month. And, sometime they catch the local illegal logger. But he said if they see big business man who are logging the forest, they will not catch. He said it is little bit strange because the illegal logger who only logs 1 cubic timber is caught and the businessmen who log hundreds cubic of timber are not caught by the police.
He said local people also begin to log the national park of Manusela, but in small scale only. It happens because community forests are getting lesser year by year. That is why; for fulfilling their need of building a new house, they will log the national park forest. In national park forest, there are still big forests with good quality.
III. Manggarai Forests
Interview with Frans and Jefri On 3rd of November at Sindha Hotel-Ruteng
I. Introduction
Manggarai people actually have big forest. But, they do not really aware of the function of their forest existence. That is why; they cut down their forest even it is really dangerous for their life. And the impact of doing that, Manggarai people already experienced some natural calamities caused by the forest degradation.
For example, in Cibal, a sub-district in Manggarai regency, there was a big natural disaster caused by a landslide. Around 20 more people died covered by a landslide. The other is the road of Ruteng-Bajawa was blocked by a big landslide. And many people should scrabble hard to pass by slippery path to reach to the other side of the road.
After experiencing and facing these kinds of negative impacts of forest degradation, the question is: are local people aware that forest existence is really important for their life? According to Frans, local people only have temporary awareness after experiencing natural disaster caused by forest degradations. But, they do not have permanent awareness. Therefore, after long time period, they will do something destroying the forest by logging even they realize that what they are doing can cause next disaster.
II. Manggaraian Forest and Its Problem
People log the timber for fulfilling their own need, and local government makes the inconsistency policy regarding on forestry. People firmly believe that the certain forest is owned by them. They got it from their ancestor for long time ago. And recently, around 1970, local government claimed that some communities forest owned by local government. This causes a vertical conflict.
This conflict was getting worse in some places in Manggarai like in Reo and Gapong. Local government acted unfairly in empowering to reforest the forestless area. At first, in Gapong, government gave seed of trees to local people and promised to give something like radio or something else to those who plant many trees. But then, after the trees are growing bigger local government did not give anything and claimed that the forest planted by those local people is own by local government.
The some cases also happened in Reo. In year of 1970, local government gave the seed of trees to local people to plant in the forestless area and local government promised to pay local people Rp. 200 per tree. But, local government did not give anything like what they promised before for local people who already planted and looked after the trees. Therefore, local people started regarding that the forest is owned by them because they who planted those trees. When local people already realized that this forest is owned by them, in year of 1990, local government unjustly planted the forest border marks really close to the village and started claiming that that forest is owned by local government. Seeing injustice which was already done by local government, some NGOs tried to side with the local people and started speaking up against local government. And local government regarded that the action of these NGOs is a part of provocative action.
Further, Frans said that in Manggarai local government does not admit the existence of community forest or the customary right of forest. And this kind of local government’s disposition causes many vertical conflicts between local people and local government in many places in Manggarai.
According to Frans, there are some ways to solve this problem. Firstly, local government should restudy and rearrange the existence of the forest borders by gathering all components of the society not only the head of the Desa but also the head of the village (tua adat, tua golo). Secondly, local government should socialize the map of forest to the local people so that they could know about it.
Interview with Fr. Simon Suban, SVD, On 3rd of November at Soverdi-Ruteng
I. Introduction
Actually, local government really concerns with its forest. But, sometimes local government produced inconsistency policy. In one side, the local government asked local people not to log the state forest. But on the other side, local government lets businessman opening a business inside forest areas like mining company in Porong Besi-Reo. The existence of this company caused around thousands hectare of government forest disappear.
II. Manggaraian Forest
In Manggarai, forest degradation could reach 1.000-1.500 ha per year. It was caused by local people and mining company. But, it is most caused by the existence of the mining company. Local people log the forest as well, but in a small scale only.
Who did give the permission of opening mining company inside government forest area? The permission was given by central department of forestry in Jakarta. And, local department of forestry does not have authority of giving permission. And in the local level, actually forestry department and mining department do not have good relationship. In one side, forestry department wants to keep the existence of the forest well, and on the other side, mining department wants to explore the mining potentiality which exists inside the conservation forest of government. According to Simon Suban, in this two last year, there are 22 permissions of mining operation in Manggarai regency. Out of 22 permissions, 4-5 permissions have already been operating in Manggarai.
The existence of mining in Manggarai in this 3 last year only contributed Rp. 321. 000. Though, the profit that the mining company could reach 5 trillions per year. It means that the local government gets nothing from the mining company.
He also said that illegal logging happened in Manggarai because of good transportation access to the forest. There are many roads that cross the forest. That is why; it is easy for illegal logger to log the timber and bring to the city by car. The other reason of illegal logging is that there is unclear forest border between government forest and community forest.
Interview with the Staff of Forest Department of Mangarai Regency on 4th November of 2008
I. Introduction
Local government in general and local forestry department in particular really concern with the existence of Manggaraian Forest. The proof is that there are many annual programs of reforestation and most of the employees of forestry always do responsibly their work in controlling and monitoring the forest. But, even they already gave the best of their work; the result is not really good because they have lack of forestry equipments and employees.
II. The Manggaraian Forest and Regent Forestry Department
2.1. The employees of Regent Forestry Department
According to the staff, Regent Forestry Department has 60 employees. Out of 60 employees, 42 employees are at the office and the rest is in the field. These amounts of employees are too limited to manage the big forest of Manggarai. The education background of the employees is various. There are 60% of employees who have forestry background, and 40% have education background on law, governance, social and economy.
Talking about forest police, they said that Manggarai forestry department only has 6 forest polices. These amounts of polices are not enough for keeping the wide area of Manggaraian forest. Moreover, forest police has no office in the forest and, therefore, they just work at the office.
2.2. The Collection of the Data
According to the staffs, data is collected by the employees living in the field. The employees in the field always give their monthly report based on their discoveries on forest existence. The employees in the field always do daily control and monitor to the forest. And sometimes, local people also take part on keeping the forest by giving information to forestry department in Ruteng or to the staffs in the field by sending an SMS if there is an illegal logging in the forest. And after hearing the information like this, the office will directly respond by sending its staffs to check the information in the field.
Actually the data that they already got, they will put on the computer. And this data will be stored in computer at various divisions of the office. The data will be put on their monthly and annual report to the forestry department in the province level. And sometimes they will send this report by an email. Since 2002, the staffs of this office have been using internet connection at their office.
About the internet, what did they use for? They said that they used computer for sending an email to the top level and also to search some information regarding forestry like the new law of forestry, ways of protecting the forest and so on.
2.3. Criteria of the type of Forest
To determine the type of state forest, regent forestry department does not have any authority. At first, district department of forestry is given some criteria of the type of forest. After receiving these forest criteria, district department of forest will see the potentiality of forest in the field based on the given criteria. And then, they will give the proposal regarding the type of forest to the central forestry department in Jakarta. And then, the central government will give the last decision or last determination about the type of the forest. And this regulation is based on forestry law on N0. 41 of 1999.
2.4. Does the District Forestry Department really Concern with Manggaraian Forest?
According to the staffs, forestry department really concerns with its forest. The proof is that there is annual program of reforestation. They do reforestation not only inside the state forest, but also outside of the state forest. And to do their program, they implement a new paradigm of forestry. Before they used to use top-down paradigm, but now they use bottom-up paradigm. It means that the core of reforestation movement is local people, not local government. Local government facilitates this program only.
But in Manggarai the illegal logging is still going on. What is the reason? According to them, there are couples of reason.
1. The forest border is unclear yet.
2. Local people do not admit the existence of state forest.
3. Some local people claimed that certain forest as their customary land.
4. There are villages inside of the state forest area.
5. There are cemeteries inside of the state forest area.
6. There are illegal logging cases.
The other reason of forest degradation is that there is mining company inside the government forest areas. And this mining company has gotten operating permission from 3 minister namely forestry minister, mining minister and domestic minister. District forestry does not have authority to give that kind of permission. But, they said the existence of mining company has a compensation for local government.
Interview with the Owner of Timber at The Sawmill in Ruteng on 4th November of 2008
I. Introduction
Most of the owner of the timber at sawmill said that the timbers, which they have, are from their own land. They did not log the timber of the state forest. But, some of them said that only few local people logged the timber inside the state forest for both selling and building a new house.
But, they said that they are not satisfied with the rule of government which obligates all of them to have permit letter before logging their own land otherwise they will not be caught by the police by the time they bring the timber to the city for selling and so on. And to have the permit letter, they should pay 50.000 till 100. 000 depended on the amount of timbers which will be logged.
II. Permit Letter and How to Sell the Timber
Before logging their own timber, they should have permit letter from the head of desa and local Department of forestry. And most of them do not like with this rule of local government. They said that they do not steal the government forest. Therefore, permit letter is no need for logging their forest.
They said that most of the timbers are not used for exporting to outside of Manggarai. They are used for own consuming like to build a new house and some projects on public buildings like school and so on. But in Manggarai Timur-Borong, there is a timber exportation to outside of Flores Island for producing triplex.
How is the price of timber? They said that the price of timber is around 800.000-1.500.000 per cubic. But sometimes they sold the timber in log. A meter of a log could be sold 10.000-20.000 per meter.
The Interview with Local People at Gapong Village on 5th November of 2008
I. Introduction
Gapong village has approximately 900 people and 164 families. This amount of people is quite big compared to their farming land. That is why; according to them, the farming land is not enough for their daily need. Moreover, some of their lands were already given to the local government since 1982. And actually, they have 20 lingkos left and 9 lingkos are still in the problem with the local government. These 20 lingkos are not enough for 164 families at this village. Practically, each family gets ¼ ha.
II. Gapong Forest and Its problem
Actually, gapong people have 20 lingkos above and road. But in the year of 1982, they already gave to local people 11 lingkos, and 9 remained lingkos became their farming land. But, recently, local government claimed that 9 lingkos also belong to local government. Because of this policy, local people and some NGOs stood up against the local government.
After giving 11 lingkos to local government, in the year of 1982-1985, local government gave concession to businessman to log timber in these 11 lingkos which are already categorized as state forest. Most of big trees are disappear now because of the logging in the year of 1982-1985. They said that they were really disappointed with this policy of local government giving concession to the businessman. They said that it is not fair.
Actually in 9 lingkos, people already planted around 7.000 of coffee trees, but they were already cut down by the government. Government claimed that this land belongs to government. These 9 lingkos are not used by local people now because they are still feeling traumatic with the local government policy. But, local people of Gapong are still trying hard to take back this land from local government. They said, “This is ours, therefore we must get it back!”
About the forest border, people of Gapong prefer Netherland forest border to local government forest border. It happens because local government forest border limits and lessens the farming land of local people. And according to them, the old regent of Mangarai in year of 2004 ever promised to rearrange and revise the local government forest border but until now the implementation is nothing.
Recently, local government prohibits them not to work in 9 lingkos because it belongs to government. Moreover, in the year of 2007, there was big land slide at the 9 lingkos killing 29 people. Based on this land slide local government accused that land slide happened because people cut down the trees in the 9 lingkos forest. But, local people said that that was a naturally happened, not because of logging.
They also promised if local government gives back 9 lingkos to them, they will use it by planting some kinds of trees like ampupu trees, coffee trees, cacao, vanilla, silver trees, and so on. These 9 lingkos will be reforested by those kinds of trees.
What is alternative income could be gotten from the forest instead of logging? They said there are some alternative incomes like fire wood, rope, honey, forest animals, jackfruits, silver trees and so on.
Galak Rego Forest and Its Problem: An Interview with Local People in Reo on 6th November of 2008
I. Introduction
Actually, galak rego forest is not virgin anymore. It happens because of mining exploration doing by PT. Surya. When going the mining place, we saw that forest is gone in the quite big hill. And, maybe the forest degradation will be bigger at that place because this company is still operating.
Regarding the impacts of the mining exploration, local people around the mining company already felt some negative impacts of mining exploration like the supply of water is decreasing; the air is getting hotter and so on. But, local people there could not speak up against local government because they have no enough intellectual capacity. But, recently they are already facilitated by some NGOs to speak up against local government who gave permit to the mining company to explore mining potentiality inside the government forest.
II. Mining Company and Its Impacts
Most of local people living around the mining company are farmer. Their life is really depended on farming land and harbor activities. Even, their life is quite difficult but they do not want to destroy the forest for fulfilling their daily need. And so far, according to them there was no any empowerment program of the local government to solve the poverty.
According to them, after local government claimed that community forest as government forest in the year of 1962, local people were forbidden to log the timber inside this forest. But, later, local government gave concession to the mining company to cut down the trees and started exploring the forest. The impact is that the forest is gone, and local people received the negative impacts. And they said that it is not fair. They said that local government already cheated us.
Local people never received any compensation of the mining company. They said that maybe local government got some compensation of the mining company. Further, they said that it is not fair that we receive the negative impact of mining and other people are happy receiving money that is not theirs. And they ever complained to the forestry department in district level regarding this case. But, forestry department said that they do not have any authority of giving permission to the mining company exploring in the government forest. That permission is given by central government. That is why; local people do not know where they should have to complain for.
Regarding the forest border, they said that the forest border is already clear. But they are not satisfied with the new forest border of the local government. They prefer
Netherlands forest border to local government forest border. And, they said that in the year of 1979/1980 local government asked local people to plant teak trees in their field with the promise of giving the gifts to local people like radio and so on. But, after the teak trees were growing bigger, in the year of 1984, local government said that these teak trees belong to government. Local government said that you (local people) have to move out from the government forest area, and local people just followed what was asked by the local government without any protests because at that time was Soeharto regime. In Soeharto regime, anyone who protests will be brought to the jail. And, they said, since that time they did not have "community forest".
They said that they usually cut down the trees in their own land by asking permit letter first from the government otherwise they will be caught by government. Sometimes, they also logged inside of the government forest for building new house. And if police catch them, they just give their illegal timber to the police, and the problem is solved. They are free and will not be brought to the court or jail by giving all of their illegal timber.
The Interview with Timber Trader in Reo on 7th October 2008
I. Introduction
When we went to the mining place in Reo, we saw many timbers collected by the employees of the trader timber. Most of the employees are from Manggarai or local people. But, the supervisors are from Surabaya. The timber that is collected is candle trees. These timber will be sent to Surabaya for making triplex.
II. The export of Silver Trees Timber to Surabaya
Before running business on Timber in Manggarai Regency, they should pay hundreds million to the Central government. And they also paid retribution before bringing the timber to Surabaya around RP. 1.000.000. At least once a month, they bring 400 cubic of timber. And in this 4 last months they already brought 4 times to Surabaya. It means that 4x400 cubic=1.600 cubic.
They bought the timbers from the local people. A candle tree is around Rp. 100.000-Rp.150.000. But, when buying a tree, they will give 5 seeds of pesangon trees freely. And, these 5 trees will be sold to them later. And they said that the price of tree is not expensive, but the employees are expensive. An employee will be paid Rp. 25.000 per day.
They said in Jawa the timber is limited. That is why; they moved to Flores for running their business. And they said that they are lucky because there is no other company which is running the same business like them in Flores.
Before cutting down their own trees for selling to the trader, local people should ask permit letter from forestry department in Ruteng.
I. The Rinjani forest, Lombok
An Interview with the Head of WWF Office in Lombok on 16th of October 2008
1. Introduction
Lombok is a small island in Nusa Tenggara Barat province with 3 million inhabitants. One of the tourism places in Lombok is National park of Rinjani. This national park is protected by the local government not only because of its tourism potentials, but also its contributions to the life of Lombok people. Actually, the mountain of Rinjani and its surrounding forests are like ‘a heart of Lombok Island’, producing fresh air and clean water for its resident. The question now is if the government and the residents really take care of it.
2. Rinjani National Park and its problems
The size of Rinjani National Park is 125.000 ha. According to the head of the WWF office in Mataram, the forests cover 60.000 ha of the park area. There is a substantial deforestation within the park, however, mainly caused by illegal loggers. The question is who the illegal loggers are. The head of WWF of Lombok expounded that illegal loggers are 600.000 people living around the National Park of Rinjani. Many people living around Rinjani depend on Rinjani forests for firewood or timber. They cut down the trees for defending their economic life.
Besides, the illegal loggers are also from outside of the people living around the forest, from the south. They come to the north of Lombok and log the forests around Rinjani. But, it is a little bit strange because people living around the forest do not prohibit south logger. Maybe, it happens because of the ownership of the forest land is local government not local people living around the forest. It means that people living there perceive that they have no privilege of Rinjani. That is why; they let the south logger to cut down the trees at National Park of Rinjani. Or, there is another possibility; they do not prohibit the south illegal logger because they are illegal loggers too.
Why are the illegal loggers really obstinate in logging the forest in Lombok? The head of WWF admitted that most of illegal loggers are poor. And poverty forces them to log the forest in Lombok. It is the reason why Lombok people become really obstinate in logging the forest. But this reason is not enough because people who are poor not automatically log the forest. There is some reason of illegal logging in Lombok.
First, the head of WWF office said that Lombok always faces deficit of timber 800 cubic per year. It means that Lombok still produces its own timber but it is limited. The need of timber in Lombok is quite high. That is why; people of Lombok really want to be an illegal logger even it is dangerous because they realize that they will get money easily by doing deforestation. Their business will develop rapidly.
Second, businessman becomes intellectual actor of deforestation in Lombok. The head of WWF Lombok admited that the intellectual actor of deforestation in lombok is businessman. They are the one who buy the illegal timbers. Or, they are the one who give money for illegal logger to cut down the trees. That is why, if forest police and local government only catch people who cut down the forest, the forestation in Lombok will not be stopped because the businessman will ask or look for the other people to log the forest for running his or her business.
Third, local people living around the forest do not support government program in monitoring the forest. The head of WWF said that people just keep quiet if the forest police or the government asks them about deforestation. Or, they will inform to illegal loggers in advance by mobile phone or other means about the coming of forest polices doing monitoring of forest area. Therefore, it is difficult to catch illegal loggers: the day of forest police monitoring is a day off for illegal loggers.
3. The local government and its alternative solution regarding deforestation in Lombok
According to the head of the WWF office, the local government really concerns with its forest in Lombok. The proof of the concern is that local government prohibits whoever to cut down trees in National Park of Rinjani and 1/3 productive area of forest in Lombok and initiates to import timber from outside of Lombok. Its concern shows us that local government really realizes the substantial function of forest. Besides that, local government has also made perda on forestation. This perda obligates downstream societies to pay a monthly amount of money to upstream societies in order to take care of the forest and avoid logging. That money is used for maintaining the forest. Forests should be taken care of so that the debit of water remains the same or can be increased from time to time. This is the main purpose of this perda, not to reduce the global warming like the program of REDD but to keep the quality and the quantity of the water.
But the further question is how the local government distributes the money of the downstream society. Is the money given directly to the upstream societies? Does every upstream family receive that money every month? The head of WWF said that the money collected from downstream societies is not given directly to the people. Upstream societies could ask for money by presenting a proposal to the local government if they need like to build POLINDES, POSTU and fulfill other public needs.
But the way of money distribution as explained above is not effective in reducing or eliminating illegal logging cases. In fact, the aim of collecting money is to prevent illegal logging of the forest area so that the quality and quantity of water are kept well every time. If upstream people who really depend on their life on forest do not get money of downstream directly to fulfill their daily needs, they will automatically log the forest for defending their life. Therefore, the mechanism and the substance of this perda should be improved by local government and its society.
II. Maluku Tengah and the Pulau Seram Forests
1) Interview with the Head of the District Department of Forestry in Masohi, 20th October 2008
This is The Table of the Size of the Forest of Maluku Tengah Regency (Ha)
Regency Conservation Forest Limited Productive Forest Permanent Productive Forest Conversion Productive Forest National Park Wild-Life Preservation And Tourism The Area Of Other Using Of Land Total
Maluku Tengah 137,584.00 180,789 33,331 130,250 189,000 14,234 61,283 746,471.00
137,584.00 180,789 33,331 130,250 189,000 14,234 61,283 746,471.00
- Introduction
Seram Island is a quite big compared to Ambon. The condition and the people are more less the same. But the air may be quite different. Talking about the air, Seram is better than Ambon because Seram is not polluted yet. And the other reason is Seram has a wide forest. If we are traveling by a ship, we can enjoy the beautiful view of the forest of Seram. Almost all the lands of Seram Island are covered by forests.
When we met the head of forestry department in Masohi, he affirmed that Seram has a wide forest. And this wide forest is still in a good control of the local government. There is very few forest was destroyed only.
- How are the Maluku Tengah forests?
Seram Island has 3 regencies. Maluku Tengah has 746.471 ha of forest. Its size is quite big and can be a very good asset for Regency of Maluku Tengah.
According to the head of forestry department, the condition of his forest is really good. This is because of good monitoring by the forestry department and the police. The forestry department can work optimally with limited facilities and 85 employees. Out of 85 employees, 55 employees are working at the central office and the rest, 30, are working in the field.
In Maluku Tengah, according head of forest department, there is no illegal logging. But, if illegal logging cases exists, it is very few. Some local people cut down the forest, but it happens only in a small scale. Local people who cut down the trees only use hand saws. That is why, he said, one tree for one month. It means that the impact of logging timber like this is not really damaging the existence of the forest.
Besides that, in Maluku Tengah, the productive forest has never been logged, even by the government. This is so because there is no mini-HPH in Maluku Tengah. The size of productive forest is 344.000 ha. Maybe, in the future, government will allow mini-HPH in Maluku Tengah.
Why is there no mini-HPH in Maluku Tengah, which has the large productive forest area? According to the head of forestry department, it happens because no businessmen have been interested in operating logging concessions in the district. He said, maybe, there will be HPH in Maluku Tengah later because some businessmen have already given a proposal to the central government for utilizing the productive forest of Maluku Tengah. If this proposal will be approved by the central government, it means that mini HPH will be immediately opened in Maluku Tengah.
But personally, the head of forestry department does not agree with the presence of HPH in Maluku Tengah. There are some reasons of his disagreement. Firstly, the presence of HPH in Maluku will destroy the existence of the forest. Secondly, the income of the presence of HPH will go to the central government. Local government gets nothing. Thirdly, if the presence of HPH causes deforestation in Maluku Tengah, he will be blamed by local and central government because he is the in charge of the existence of the forest.
He said the Indonesian government does not have a consistent policy regarding the issue of saving the forest. On one side, the government claims to stop all illegal logging and save our beloved forest. But on the other side, the government by the presence of HPH and mini-HPH allows the businessmen to log the forest. He said the policy of the Indonesian government regarding the safety of the forest is contradictive in itself.
Talking about the forest borders, he said that borders in Seram in general and in Maluku Tengah in particular are quite problematic. Some local people are still relaying on the Netherland forest borders. They do not know or admit the new forest border of the Indonesian government. That is why they cut down the forests owned by the government. Besides, these unclear forest borders have been causing horizontal conflicts between different communities of the local people.
He mentioned some reasons why illegal logging in Maluku Tengah is really small. Firstly, local government really takes care of its forest. The police and forestry department have really committed themselves to looking after the forest. Secondly, local people have their own forests. According to the data, in Maluku Tengah there are 61.283 ha of forest which is called “the area of other using”. And the private forest is included in this category. He said that if local people log their own forest, it is not recognized as illegal logging because the UU insists that illegal loggers are people who log the timber inside the government forests only. But before logging their own forest, local people should ask permission to the forestry department, bringing with its requirements like certification of the land and the others.
III. Local People and Local government Role and Their role for Taking Care the Forest
3.1. Local People
Local people in Maluku Tengah really concern with their own forest. The concern of the forest is shown by willingness of the people to take care the forest from all kinds of exploitations.
In local level, there is local informal institution which is built for keeping the safety of the forest. This local informal institution is called “Kewang”. The head of the Kewang is chosen by the Kepala Desa (the head of the district). Actually, the head of the Kewang is a strongest man in the Village so that he could keep the existence of the forest.
This local informal institution will give punishment for the people logging the forest by sticking the illegal logger. And this kind of local informal institution still exists until now.
3.2. Local government
The proof of the good concern of local government is that local government does good monitoring of its forest so that illegal logging could be avoided. And, therefore, the head of forestry department firmly believes that there is no any illegal logging in Maluku Tengah.
According to the head of forestry department, local government in general and forest department in particular as a pioneer of keeping the forest existence have difficulties in the field regarding monitoring of the forest. Those difficulties are caused by lack of forest facilities like cars and boats. He said they, forestry department, already gave their proposals to the central government regarding the forest facilities, but the realization of those proposals are nothing until now.
Finally, at the end of the interview, he hoped that the future of the Maluku Tengah forest should be more paid attention by the central government by producing of better policy of the forestry and by providing good forest facilities for the field employees. And he entrusted his hoping to Stein so as to deliver to the central government. And he was so grateful and agreed with the presence of the REDD program which is expounded by Stein, even it is a little bit late. Many forests have been destroying, and the REDDY has just come. Though, he said even it is late, we should do something for our forests rather than do nothing.
- The National Park of Manusela: Interview with the Head of the office,
21st October 2008
This is the table of National Park of Manusela
No The Category of National Park forest Size (Ha) %
1 Primary forest 128.853 68,18
2 Secondary forest 12.702 6,72
3 Estate/farming land/rice field 4.268 2,26
4 Bushes 4.531 2,40
5 Open land (lahan kosong) 669 0,35
6 Village 291 0,15
7 Mangrove 3.954 2,09
8 the others (lain-lain) 1.801 0,95
9 The area of river system 31.931 16,89
Total 189.000 100
- Introduction
National park of Manusela is a conservation area with its size 189.000 ha (SK Menhut No.281/kpts-VI/1997) which located in Maluku Tengah Regency-Maluku province. It is very beautiful and should be very nice place for tourism. But, unfortunately, this national park is rare visiting by both domestic and foreigner tourist. According to the head of national park office based on the data of 2007, the foreigner visitors of national park are only 97 people. But, he said that the amount of visitors should be more than 97 people because some of visitors did not report themselves before going inside of national park.
The national park of Manusela has quite big forest, and it is dominated by primary forest. But the existence of the national park is threatened especially by the local people living around the forest border of national park. Besides, the other threat is from the government itself. HPH will be built, and the department of mining indicated that under the national park there are mining materials which is should be explored. But, anyway, the head of national park is still defending the existence of national park because he realizes that its existence is really important for the life of human being in general and especially for people of Maluku Tengah regency.
- National Park and Its Problem
The National park of Manusela is decided by Forestry Minister as a national park in 1997. But the conservation of its existence is still not optimal. It happens because of some reasons. Firstly, unclear forest border of national park of Manuseal has caused a problematic challenge for its conservation. Local people easily go inside of the national park opening new field or new farming land. They do not know about the forest border. And the head of the national park said that most of border marks were destroyed when the conflict in 1999 was broken in Ambon and Seram. The loss of border marks makes the border of national park unclear and problematic so that local people easily go inside of national park of Manusela. Most of the land that local people used to use for opening a new field is forestless. This land is ex-HPH land which operated in Maluku Tengah in 1982-1988. And HPH, according to him, will be reopened, and it will be a challenge for his office to defense the existence of national park.
Secondly, most of local people are not aware yet about the function of the forest existence especially the existence of the national park of Manusela. It happens because of easy going mentality of uneducated people living around the national park of Manusela. Besides that most of people living there are poor farmers. That is why; they really rely on forest potentiality to defense their life even by cutting down the forest at the national park of Manusela. Or, local people living there claimed that the forest is owned by them. They already got inherently the forest from their ancestors. This sometimes raises a problem in keeping the national park.
Thirdly, lack of forestry equipments like car, motor bike and the others causes his employees do not work efficiently especially in monitoring the national park.
Fourthly, there is a lack of employees. In his office, he said there are 79 employees. Half is working at the office with the administration and the rest is in the field. But, the amounts of the employees are not enough. To solve this problem, the office uses 60 local people to be employees in the field for keeping the safety of the national park. These 60 local people are called PAM Swakarsa. They are paid monthly by the office.
Talking about the illegal logging, he said that there are illegal logging cases at national park but in a small scale only. Why is only in a small scale? It happens because of the small amount of people living around the national park forest border. Actually, there are some villages which are closed to the forest border. They, sometimes, do illegal logging but in small scale only.
Are there any alternative incomes from the national park of Manusela instead of cutting down the forest? He said there are a lot of alternative incomes could be taken from national park of Manusela. Therefore, they are still planning to empower the local people so as to utilize this alternative income of the forest. He mentioned some kinds of the empowerment that they already did and still in planning. These are some kinds of empowerment:
1. The office already distributed the seed of cacao and myristica fragrans (pala) to local people so as to plant in their field. Hopefully, they will get more income from these kinds of plant.
2. The office is still planning to teach people to run business on butterfly farm.
3. The office suggested people to get more income by getting resin from national park forest. It is not dangerous because people only cut the bark of the trees for getting sap.
4. The office is planning to teach people how to open orchid farm. They can get orchid from inside of the national park of Manusela and extend outside of Manusela. It can be a good commodity for gaining the income of the family.
5. The office will teach people how to plant and look after a kind of tree, namely calophyllum inophyllum. This kind of tree can be good commodity.
6. People are suggested to plant aleurites moluccana, durian and the other plants so that they could increase their income. They could get durian and other plants inside of the national park.
7. The office wants to promote national Manusela so as to attract both domestic and foreigner tourist. If many tourists come to national park of Manusela, people have chance in running business in handicraft, hotel and cottage. Besides, local people can be a tourist guide. It can be an alternative income of the national park of Manusela for the local people living around the park.
And at the end of the interview, the head of national park office hoped that the research of Stein could reduce the challenges of keeping the forest. At least, the result of research can raise the awareness of the local people to take care their forest. Besides that he hoped that Stein can help them how to get the forest facilities. By the good facilities, they will work better in monitoring the existence of the Manusela forest.
About, the REDD program, the head of national park really supported. He said that by the program of buying carbon dioxide he will work harder to maintain Manusela forest so that they could sell carbon dioxide for the welfare of local government in general and local people living around the forest in particular.
Saka Village and the National Park of Manusela, An interview with the Secretary of Desa Saka on 22nd October 2008
I. Introduction
Saka is a local village which is not far away from the national park of Manusela. Saka is a village included in the ownership of Horale (Pertuanan Horale). Horale ever experienced land conflict with its neighbor village Soleman. The conflict broke when Soleman people claimed that the land of Horale people as their land. Horale people said that Soleman people are many but they have small farming land. And Horale people are small but they have big farming land. This is the reason why Soleman people want to take the land of its neighbor village, Horale.
Further, Horale people in Saka said that this problem was also caused by the local government. Local government had an empowerment program by distributing teak trees to Soleman people. And Soleman people planted those teak trees on the land of Horale People. Soleman people already knew that that land is owned by Horale but they still planted teak trees. But even this conflict have been lasting for 2 years, local government does not solve this conflict yet.
II. National Park of Manusela and Saka People
National park of Manusela is not far away from Desa Saka. According to the local village, desa Saka is around 8 kilometers from the national park forest border. Even the distance is really close but Saka people do not log the national forest.
According to the secretary of the desa Saka, people of Saka never logged the national park forest. It happens because the national park forest polices always do monitoring 3 times in a month and socialize about the forest border to the local people, and ask them not to cut down the forest and not to open farming land inside the national park. Therefore, most of Saka people already knew about the national forest border. But, before knowing the forest border of national park, people of Saka went inside of national park and logged many kinds of trees like linggua, desi and the others for both selling and building a new house. According to him, only people of Soleman who went inside the national forest even they know it is prohibited by the government. That is way; the existence of the national park is threatened.
He said people in Saka, log their own forest. Desa Saka itself has its own forest. This community forest is logged and then sold by the desa institution. The money of selling this timber will totally go to the desa. Besides that local people also have their own forest. In Saka, there are 14 clans, and every clan has its own forest. Every family could cut its own forest both for selling and building a new house. The head of clan will distribute to every family of his people regarding customary forest. But, if local people want to cut down their forest and bring outside of Saka, they should have permit letter from the head of desa otherwise they will be caught by the police on the way of bringing outside of Saka.
Further, he said that the existence of the national park is threatened by irresponsibly people. The other local people are not afraid of going inside of Manusela Park and log the timbers there. Besides that he said there is a military running business on timber. His name is Labiru. He has 14 chain saws operate in the forest. Local people are afraid of this military because of his uniforms. Therefore, local people just keep quiet when seeing his employees are logging inside the government forest.
Most of Saka people are poor. The majority of people are farmer and some of them are fisherman. Most of them only have elementary school degree. The main income of the Saka people is from cacao, banana and coconut. But the income is up and down depending on the harvest. Though, even they are poor, they do not log the government forest for fulfilling their daily need.
Actually, there are some alternative incomes from the forest which could gain their income. These alternative incomes are rattan, resin and conarium commune. But, most of Saka people do not know how to utilize these alternative incomes. Besides that there is no buyer for these alternative incomes especially for rattan. But for other commodities like cacao, coconut and banana, there are many buyers. The buyers usually came to the desa. That is why; local people here do not need to go to Masohi for selling their commodities.
Talking about the empowerment, people in Saka sometimes got assistance of local government. The organization of house wife (PKK) ever got fund for making coconut oil. But, the fund was already stopped. Besides, this desa was ever given a boat and a chain saw from Social Department. But, according to the secretary of desa Saka, this empowerment of local government is not enough for eliminating poverty in this village.
Sawai Vilage and the National Park of Manusela: An interview with the Secretary of Desa Sawai on 22nd October 2006
I. Introduction
Sawai is a north village of Seram Island which almost touches the border of national park of Manusela. Actually, Sawai is one of the oldest villages in Seram. According to the history, long time ago, Sawai is one of the small king in Seram and Netherland admitted the existence of this king by giving a gold stick to the king of Sawai.
II. Sawai, its forest and National Park of Manusela
Sawai has 800 families and 4.100 people. Most of people work as farmer, fisherman, craftsman and trader. They are living in a very peaceful village even they said that they are poor. But their income by harvesting their farming plant and other works like fishing is quite big. And it justifies that they are not really poor. Even some of their children are still studying at the university. Their income is from vanilla, copra, clove, durian, cacao, and fishing.
Do Sawai people log the government forest even they have enough income for their daily need? According to the secretary of desa Sawai, people of Sawai do not log the government forest like at the national park of Manusela. It happens because of the strict control and monitoring of forest polices. He said Sawai people ever logged the national park forest but only in the year of 1970. Since 1986, they did not log the government forest anymore now.
But, some of Sawai villagers have their own chain saw more than 20 chain saws. They use these chain saws for logging the government forest because their private forest is already getting lesser. But, according to the secretary, Sawai people do not use chain saws for logging the government forest. They use chain saws for cut down their private forest. In Sawai, people have their own forest land. That is why; they have an authority to cut down their forest but should be with the permission of the head of desa. Mostly, the customary forest land does not have the land certificate. And the border between customary forest land and government forest is not so clear. Therefore, it causes the problem of keeping the forest.
Secretary of desa Sawai also said that there are some villagers who log the government forest but in a small scale only. It is a threat. That is why; there are some local people chosen by the head of desa as a response of the request of the national park of Manusela to be forest guardians. And the national park of Manusela office will pay around Rp. 500.000, 00 per year. And he said, the government forest is not threaten by local people only but also by military and police. Recently, 5 militaries were caught and brought to the jail. They were running the business on timber by logging inside the government forest.
Talking about society empowerment, according to the secretary, Sawai gets many empowerment programs from government. These are the programs:
1. Sawai has IDT program. It means that some of Sawai people are poor. That is why; this program has aims to reduce and even eliminating poverty.
2. There is empowerment program done by local animals department. The department of animals gives cows and goats to people.
3. There is empowerment program from agriculture department by giving seeds of cacao and hybrid coconut.
But he said sometimes the program is not suitable with the need of the local people. For instance, a family is farmer and they are given fish net as an assistance of empowerment program from local government. It is not suitable with the background of this family. This family will sell this fish net for another fisherman later. It happens because no cooperation between local government and the desa government. Government gives the program directly without including desa government. Further, he said if by the time of regent representative election, people will get many empowerment programs. It happens because behind the empowerment program, there are politic interests of certain people.
Chain saws Men and Their Work: An Interview with 2 Chain saw Men on 23rd of October 2008 in Sawai
I. Introduction
There are two chain saw men. They have been working as a chain saw man 20 and 15 years. According to them, to be a chain saw man is very difficult because there are many risks like caught by the police and military and pressed by the timber. But, to be chain saw man will get much money. The income of chain saw man is around 7-10 million per month. Because of this big income they are motivated to be a chain saw man.
II. Chain saw men and their work
1. The first chain saw man.
“To be a chain saw man is a choice of life. I am poor; therefore I will defense our life by logging the trees. I log our own forest and also I am paid by other people to log their timber. Whoever asks me to log their timber even inside the forest of national park of Manusela, I will do it. I do like that because I need money, and without money my family will eat nothing”. This is the statement of a chain saw man.
“I ever went inside the national park more then 20 times for logging the forest there. I did that because I was asked by the business man or by local people. And I thought that I will not be caught by the police because I am here by other people to log the trees. The police will catch people paying me. But, if the business men are police, military or national park employees; they will not be caught even logging inside the Nationalm Park.
He ever experienced that he was almost beaten and caught by a military. But, after the businessman who asked him to cut the trees at the national park gave a sum of money, he could continue log the forest. At that time, they gave money around Rp. 500.000. He said that they are not afraid of cutting down the trees in government forest if they already have a sum of money for bribing the police or military.
He said more 20 illegal loggers inside the national park logging the forest of national park everyday. And most of them are working for businessman running on timber. Most of businessmen are police and military. In Seram, most of timber businessmen are police and military. He said the business of timber will get much money. But, sometimes these businessmen ever cheated chain saws men. They took the timber without paying any money for him and the other chain saw man.
2. The second chain saw man
He has been working as chain saw man for 15 years. He uses his chain saw for cut his own timber and the other timber. And sometimes he logs the forest of national park of Manusela.
He went and logged inside to national park not because of unclear forest border. He already fully knew the forest border of national park, but because of economic pressure he did like that. He said he never be caught by the police or military. It happens because of some reason.
1. The national park is really big. Therefore, if the polices are in one side of the forest, they will log in the other side. He said the forest polices are limited, and it is impossible, they could take care the whole national park.
2. Most of the businessmen of timber are police and military. That is why; the safety of the chain saw man is ok. They will not be caught even logging in the government forest.
3. Illegal loggers could bribe forest police.
He said there are more than 20 chain saw men in national park per day. Most of chain saw men who still operating in the government forest never caught by the police. That is why; they are not discouraged yet. But most of chain saw men who ever caught by the police are discouraged of logging government forest.
He said it is difficult to reduce forest degradation in Seram even the forest police are really strict in monitoring the forest. Illegal loggers are cleverer than the police. And to be a chain saw man is a work of illegal logger only. Therefore, if government wants to reduce the forest degradation in Seram, government should create a new job for illegal logger like him.
For instance, he is a chain man now. But, he wants to change his job because to be a chain saw man is very difficult. He wants to be a fisherman. That is why; if government gives him a good fish net, he will leave his job as a chain saw man.
Forest Guardian of the National Park of Manusela: An Interview with Forest Guardian of National Park of Manusela on 23rd of October 2008 in Sawai
He has been forest guardian of national park of Manusela for 5 years. But in this last 4 months, he did not work his duty as forest guardian because they do not have Kepala Desa yet. Actually, Kepala desa commands and controls them to work as forest guardian.
There are 4 forest guardian of desa Sawai. They were chosen by the Kepala desa as the response of the request of national park office. And they will be paid by the national park Rp. 1.000.000, 00 per year. But this payment has a realization in 2003 only. From 2004-2008, they were not paid anymore. But, they are still working because kepala desa asks them to work. Kepala desa asks them because they are also employees of desa Sawai.
They work 5 days per week, Friday and Sunday are day off. Out of 4 people, they divided into 2 groups. Each group will work for a week and then changed by other group. They work from 8 a.m-5p.a.
Since he had been a forest guardian, he already caught local people who logged national park of Manusela 3 times. But he did not bring them to the jail. He only asked, what for do you log the government forest? Most of them said that we want to build a new house. Then, he said, it is ok. After finishing this last tree, you have to stop. And he started to explain to them about the existence of the national park.
And, he said he ever met police and military and their employees who were logging the national park forest. But, he just kept quite. He was afraid of beating by the police or military. His friends ever experienced of being beaten by the military when prohibiting a police and his employees not to cut the national forest.
He said forest police now is quite strict. They do monitoring 1-3 times per month. And, sometime they catch the local illegal logger. But he said if they see big business man who are logging the forest, they will not catch. He said it is little bit strange because the illegal logger who only logs 1 cubic timber is caught and the businessmen who log hundreds cubic of timber are not caught by the police.
He said local people also begin to log the national park of Manusela, but in small scale only. It happens because community forests are getting lesser year by year. That is why; for fulfilling their need of building a new house, they will log the national park forest. In national park forest, there are still big forests with good quality.
III. Manggarai Forests
Interview with Frans and Jefri On 3rd of November at Sindha Hotel-Ruteng
I. Introduction
Manggarai people actually have big forest. But, they do not really aware of the function of their forest existence. That is why; they cut down their forest even it is really dangerous for their life. And the impact of doing that, Manggarai people already experienced some natural calamities caused by the forest degradation.
For example, in Cibal, a sub-district in Manggarai regency, there was a big natural disaster caused by a landslide. Around 20 more people died covered by a landslide. The other is the road of Ruteng-Bajawa was blocked by a big landslide. And many people should scrabble hard to pass by slippery path to reach to the other side of the road.
After experiencing and facing these kinds of negative impacts of forest degradation, the question is: are local people aware that forest existence is really important for their life? According to Frans, local people only have temporary awareness after experiencing natural disaster caused by forest degradations. But, they do not have permanent awareness. Therefore, after long time period, they will do something destroying the forest by logging even they realize that what they are doing can cause next disaster.
II. Manggaraian Forest and Its Problem
People log the timber for fulfilling their own need, and local government makes the inconsistency policy regarding on forestry. People firmly believe that the certain forest is owned by them. They got it from their ancestor for long time ago. And recently, around 1970, local government claimed that some communities forest owned by local government. This causes a vertical conflict.
This conflict was getting worse in some places in Manggarai like in Reo and Gapong. Local government acted unfairly in empowering to reforest the forestless area. At first, in Gapong, government gave seed of trees to local people and promised to give something like radio or something else to those who plant many trees. But then, after the trees are growing bigger local government did not give anything and claimed that the forest planted by those local people is own by local government.
The some cases also happened in Reo. In year of 1970, local government gave the seed of trees to local people to plant in the forestless area and local government promised to pay local people Rp. 200 per tree. But, local government did not give anything like what they promised before for local people who already planted and looked after the trees. Therefore, local people started regarding that the forest is owned by them because they who planted those trees. When local people already realized that this forest is owned by them, in year of 1990, local government unjustly planted the forest border marks really close to the village and started claiming that that forest is owned by local government. Seeing injustice which was already done by local government, some NGOs tried to side with the local people and started speaking up against local government. And local government regarded that the action of these NGOs is a part of provocative action.
Further, Frans said that in Manggarai local government does not admit the existence of community forest or the customary right of forest. And this kind of local government’s disposition causes many vertical conflicts between local people and local government in many places in Manggarai.
According to Frans, there are some ways to solve this problem. Firstly, local government should restudy and rearrange the existence of the forest borders by gathering all components of the society not only the head of the Desa but also the head of the village (tua adat, tua golo). Secondly, local government should socialize the map of forest to the local people so that they could know about it.
Interview with Fr. Simon Suban, SVD, On 3rd of November at Soverdi-Ruteng
I. Introduction
Actually, local government really concerns with its forest. But, sometimes local government produced inconsistency policy. In one side, the local government asked local people not to log the state forest. But on the other side, local government lets businessman opening a business inside forest areas like mining company in Porong Besi-Reo. The existence of this company caused around thousands hectare of government forest disappear.
II. Manggaraian Forest
In Manggarai, forest degradation could reach 1.000-1.500 ha per year. It was caused by local people and mining company. But, it is most caused by the existence of the mining company. Local people log the forest as well, but in a small scale only.
Who did give the permission of opening mining company inside government forest area? The permission was given by central department of forestry in Jakarta. And, local department of forestry does not have authority of giving permission. And in the local level, actually forestry department and mining department do not have good relationship. In one side, forestry department wants to keep the existence of the forest well, and on the other side, mining department wants to explore the mining potentiality which exists inside the conservation forest of government. According to Simon Suban, in this two last year, there are 22 permissions of mining operation in Manggarai regency. Out of 22 permissions, 4-5 permissions have already been operating in Manggarai.
The existence of mining in Manggarai in this 3 last year only contributed Rp. 321. 000. Though, the profit that the mining company could reach 5 trillions per year. It means that the local government gets nothing from the mining company.
He also said that illegal logging happened in Manggarai because of good transportation access to the forest. There are many roads that cross the forest. That is why; it is easy for illegal logger to log the timber and bring to the city by car. The other reason of illegal logging is that there is unclear forest border between government forest and community forest.
Interview with the Staff of Forest Department of Mangarai Regency on 4th November of 2008
I. Introduction
Local government in general and local forestry department in particular really concern with the existence of Manggaraian Forest. The proof is that there are many annual programs of reforestation and most of the employees of forestry always do responsibly their work in controlling and monitoring the forest. But, even they already gave the best of their work; the result is not really good because they have lack of forestry equipments and employees.
II. The Manggaraian Forest and Regent Forestry Department
2.1. The employees of Regent Forestry Department
According to the staff, Regent Forestry Department has 60 employees. Out of 60 employees, 42 employees are at the office and the rest is in the field. These amounts of employees are too limited to manage the big forest of Manggarai. The education background of the employees is various. There are 60% of employees who have forestry background, and 40% have education background on law, governance, social and economy.
Talking about forest police, they said that Manggarai forestry department only has 6 forest polices. These amounts of polices are not enough for keeping the wide area of Manggaraian forest. Moreover, forest police has no office in the forest and, therefore, they just work at the office.
2.2. The Collection of the Data
According to the staffs, data is collected by the employees living in the field. The employees in the field always give their monthly report based on their discoveries on forest existence. The employees in the field always do daily control and monitor to the forest. And sometimes, local people also take part on keeping the forest by giving information to forestry department in Ruteng or to the staffs in the field by sending an SMS if there is an illegal logging in the forest. And after hearing the information like this, the office will directly respond by sending its staffs to check the information in the field.
Actually the data that they already got, they will put on the computer. And this data will be stored in computer at various divisions of the office. The data will be put on their monthly and annual report to the forestry department in the province level. And sometimes they will send this report by an email. Since 2002, the staffs of this office have been using internet connection at their office.
About the internet, what did they use for? They said that they used computer for sending an email to the top level and also to search some information regarding forestry like the new law of forestry, ways of protecting the forest and so on.
2.3. Criteria of the type of Forest
To determine the type of state forest, regent forestry department does not have any authority. At first, district department of forestry is given some criteria of the type of forest. After receiving these forest criteria, district department of forest will see the potentiality of forest in the field based on the given criteria. And then, they will give the proposal regarding the type of forest to the central forestry department in Jakarta. And then, the central government will give the last decision or last determination about the type of the forest. And this regulation is based on forestry law on N0. 41 of 1999.
2.4. Does the District Forestry Department really Concern with Manggaraian Forest?
According to the staffs, forestry department really concerns with its forest. The proof is that there is annual program of reforestation. They do reforestation not only inside the state forest, but also outside of the state forest. And to do their program, they implement a new paradigm of forestry. Before they used to use top-down paradigm, but now they use bottom-up paradigm. It means that the core of reforestation movement is local people, not local government. Local government facilitates this program only.
But in Manggarai the illegal logging is still going on. What is the reason? According to them, there are couples of reason.
1. The forest border is unclear yet.
2. Local people do not admit the existence of state forest.
3. Some local people claimed that certain forest as their customary land.
4. There are villages inside of the state forest area.
5. There are cemeteries inside of the state forest area.
6. There are illegal logging cases.
The other reason of forest degradation is that there is mining company inside the government forest areas. And this mining company has gotten operating permission from 3 minister namely forestry minister, mining minister and domestic minister. District forestry does not have authority to give that kind of permission. But, they said the existence of mining company has a compensation for local government.
Interview with the Owner of Timber at The Sawmill in Ruteng on 4th November of 2008
I. Introduction
Most of the owner of the timber at sawmill said that the timbers, which they have, are from their own land. They did not log the timber of the state forest. But, some of them said that only few local people logged the timber inside the state forest for both selling and building a new house.
But, they said that they are not satisfied with the rule of government which obligates all of them to have permit letter before logging their own land otherwise they will not be caught by the police by the time they bring the timber to the city for selling and so on. And to have the permit letter, they should pay 50.000 till 100. 000 depended on the amount of timbers which will be logged.
II. Permit Letter and How to Sell the Timber
Before logging their own timber, they should have permit letter from the head of desa and local Department of forestry. And most of them do not like with this rule of local government. They said that they do not steal the government forest. Therefore, permit letter is no need for logging their forest.
They said that most of the timbers are not used for exporting to outside of Manggarai. They are used for own consuming like to build a new house and some projects on public buildings like school and so on. But in Manggarai Timur-Borong, there is a timber exportation to outside of Flores Island for producing triplex.
How is the price of timber? They said that the price of timber is around 800.000-1.500.000 per cubic. But sometimes they sold the timber in log. A meter of a log could be sold 10.000-20.000 per meter.
The Interview with Local People at Gapong Village on 5th November of 2008
I. Introduction
Gapong village has approximately 900 people and 164 families. This amount of people is quite big compared to their farming land. That is why; according to them, the farming land is not enough for their daily need. Moreover, some of their lands were already given to the local government since 1982. And actually, they have 20 lingkos left and 9 lingkos are still in the problem with the local government. These 20 lingkos are not enough for 164 families at this village. Practically, each family gets ¼ ha.
II. Gapong Forest and Its problem
Actually, gapong people have 20 lingkos above and road. But in the year of 1982, they already gave to local people 11 lingkos, and 9 remained lingkos became their farming land. But, recently, local government claimed that 9 lingkos also belong to local government. Because of this policy, local people and some NGOs stood up against the local government.
After giving 11 lingkos to local government, in the year of 1982-1985, local government gave concession to businessman to log timber in these 11 lingkos which are already categorized as state forest. Most of big trees are disappear now because of the logging in the year of 1982-1985. They said that they were really disappointed with this policy of local government giving concession to the businessman. They said that it is not fair.
Actually in 9 lingkos, people already planted around 7.000 of coffee trees, but they were already cut down by the government. Government claimed that this land belongs to government. These 9 lingkos are not used by local people now because they are still feeling traumatic with the local government policy. But, local people of Gapong are still trying hard to take back this land from local government. They said, “This is ours, therefore we must get it back!”
About the forest border, people of Gapong prefer Netherland forest border to local government forest border. It happens because local government forest border limits and lessens the farming land of local people. And according to them, the old regent of Mangarai in year of 2004 ever promised to rearrange and revise the local government forest border but until now the implementation is nothing.
Recently, local government prohibits them not to work in 9 lingkos because it belongs to government. Moreover, in the year of 2007, there was big land slide at the 9 lingkos killing 29 people. Based on this land slide local government accused that land slide happened because people cut down the trees in the 9 lingkos forest. But, local people said that that was a naturally happened, not because of logging.
They also promised if local government gives back 9 lingkos to them, they will use it by planting some kinds of trees like ampupu trees, coffee trees, cacao, vanilla, silver trees, and so on. These 9 lingkos will be reforested by those kinds of trees.
What is alternative income could be gotten from the forest instead of logging? They said there are some alternative incomes like fire wood, rope, honey, forest animals, jackfruits, silver trees and so on.
Galak Rego Forest and Its Problem: An Interview with Local People in Reo on 6th November of 2008
I. Introduction
Actually, galak rego forest is not virgin anymore. It happens because of mining exploration doing by PT. Surya. When going the mining place, we saw that forest is gone in the quite big hill. And, maybe the forest degradation will be bigger at that place because this company is still operating.
Regarding the impacts of the mining exploration, local people around the mining company already felt some negative impacts of mining exploration like the supply of water is decreasing; the air is getting hotter and so on. But, local people there could not speak up against local government because they have no enough intellectual capacity. But, recently they are already facilitated by some NGOs to speak up against local government who gave permit to the mining company to explore mining potentiality inside the government forest.
II. Mining Company and Its Impacts
Most of local people living around the mining company are farmer. Their life is really depended on farming land and harbor activities. Even, their life is quite difficult but they do not want to destroy the forest for fulfilling their daily need. And so far, according to them there was no any empowerment program of the local government to solve the poverty.
According to them, after local government claimed that community forest as government forest in the year of 1962, local people were forbidden to log the timber inside this forest. But, later, local government gave concession to the mining company to cut down the trees and started exploring the forest. The impact is that the forest is gone, and local people received the negative impacts. And they said that it is not fair. They said that local government already cheated us.
Local people never received any compensation of the mining company. They said that maybe local government got some compensation of the mining company. Further, they said that it is not fair that we receive the negative impact of mining and other people are happy receiving money that is not theirs. And they ever complained to the forestry department in district level regarding this case. But, forestry department said that they do not have any authority of giving permission to the mining company exploring in the government forest. That permission is given by central government. That is why; local people do not know where they should have to complain for.
Regarding the forest border, they said that the forest border is already clear. But they are not satisfied with the new forest border of the local government. They prefer
Netherlands forest border to local government forest border. And, they said that in the year of 1979/1980 local government asked local people to plant teak trees in their field with the promise of giving the gifts to local people like radio and so on. But, after the teak trees were growing bigger, in the year of 1984, local government said that these teak trees belong to government. Local government said that you (local people) have to move out from the government forest area, and local people just followed what was asked by the local government without any protests because at that time was Soeharto regime. In Soeharto regime, anyone who protests will be brought to the jail. And, they said, since that time they did not have "community forest".
They said that they usually cut down the trees in their own land by asking permit letter first from the government otherwise they will be caught by government. Sometimes, they also logged inside of the government forest for building new house. And if police catch them, they just give their illegal timber to the police, and the problem is solved. They are free and will not be brought to the court or jail by giving all of their illegal timber.
The Interview with Timber Trader in Reo on 7th October 2008
I. Introduction
When we went to the mining place in Reo, we saw many timbers collected by the employees of the trader timber. Most of the employees are from Manggarai or local people. But, the supervisors are from Surabaya. The timber that is collected is candle trees. These timber will be sent to Surabaya for making triplex.
II. The export of Silver Trees Timber to Surabaya
Before running business on Timber in Manggarai Regency, they should pay hundreds million to the Central government. And they also paid retribution before bringing the timber to Surabaya around RP. 1.000.000. At least once a month, they bring 400 cubic of timber. And in this 4 last months they already brought 4 times to Surabaya. It means that 4x400 cubic=1.600 cubic.
They bought the timbers from the local people. A candle tree is around Rp. 100.000-Rp.150.000. But, when buying a tree, they will give 5 seeds of pesangon trees freely. And, these 5 trees will be sold to them later. And they said that the price of tree is not expensive, but the employees are expensive. An employee will be paid Rp. 25.000 per day.
They said in Jawa the timber is limited. That is why; they moved to Flores for running their business. And they said that they are lucky because there is no other company which is running the same business like them in Flores.
Before cutting down their own trees for selling to the trader, local people should ask permit letter from forestry department in Ruteng.
Komentar