Indonesian Forest Management Problems: What Are the Comments and Opinions of the Groups and Organizations Concerned?

Abstract

In Indonesia, some aspects of the forest management problems have been raised, and the need to look for the solutions toward sustainable forest management is deemed necessary. The objectives of this study are (1) to clarify the forest problems in Indonesia, (2) to collect the comments and opinions of the persons concerned with the forest problems and (3) to propose solutions to forest problems in Indonesia. The research was based on interviews from various respondents : Ministry of Forestry and Estate Crops (MOFEC), the Regional Forestry Office, the Provincial Forestry Service, university lecturers, private concessionaires, the forest product industry, Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), and the Forest Product Development Research Center (FPDRC). The interviews and discussions were focused on four topics : the imbalance between wood supply and demand, deforestation issues, forest disturbances, and conflicts between forest concessionaires and forest communities. The interview results showed that an increasing number of forest industries has caused the scarcity of wood, and thus has driven the concessionaires to illegal logging in order to compensate for the low supply of wood. MOFEC policy in forest utilization has tended to support the concessionaire in order to increase the foreign currency. On the other hand, it has caused negative impacts for the forest communities. Most problems of forest utilization in Indonesia are the result of the lack of forest resources data, weakness in forest area control due to the small number of forest security personnels compared to the forest area, efficiency of wood harvesting and processing techniques, and overlapping areas of forest concession and land tenure. Based on the research, the author proposes the following programs; (1) improving the industrial timber estate area in order to increase the wood supply, (2) matching wood supply to capacity of the forest industry when issuing the forest product industry licenses, (3) improving the wood efficiency in the forest industry, (4) increasing the forest security abilities to reduce the number of forest disturbances, (5) strengthening the control of the wood market to prevent the trade of illegal logs, and (6) involving the forest community in the forest management more intensively.