National park policy a conundrum<\/p>\n
By Silvia Werner<\/p>\n
JAKARTA (JP): Creating national parks will not solve the
\ncomplex problem of conserving forest areas.<\/p>\n
Areas assigned to become national park land in Indonesia are
\nusually already surrounded, although sparsely, by traditional
\nfarmers who are seen as a threat to the park's environment.<\/p>\n
Unfortunately, the decision to designate an area as a national
\npark is made by national governments without any discussion with
\nlocal governments or people which inevitably leads to conflict.<\/p>\n
Apart from the various difficulties local governments face in
\nestablishing and supervising a new national park, what about the
\npeople who live in that area? How can we deal with this conflict?<\/p>\n
These areas share a few common characteristics. They are
\nusually primary, virgin forests that have little or no
\ninfrastructure like roads, electricity or public services.<\/p>\n
Agricultural production is mainly limited to the subsistence
\nproduction of rice, fruits and vegetables while cash production
\ncovers mainly goods which can be produced without fertilizer or
\npesticides. These products must also be easy to transport, sell
\nand store because market access in the area is often very
\ndifficult.<\/p>\n
In the lowland areas, on red-yellow podsolic soils with low
\nnatural fertility, rubber is the main cash crop, whereas in the
\nhighlands cinnamon production is frequent. Income might be
\nsupplemented by non-timber forest products like rattan, resins
\nand medicinal plants collected by local people from the primary
\nforests.<\/p>\n
Because these people depend very much on nature, they
\ngenerally have a profound knowledge about plants and their uses,
\nsoils and their suitability, as well as how to use natural
\nresources without destroying them.<\/p>\n
However, since the rigid concept of a national park does not
\nallow human endeavors, the local farmers are an obstacle in the
\neye of many conservationists and development planners.<\/p>\n
The story of the forest-eating shifting cultivator suits park
\ndevelopers well in justifying the decision to uproot and resettle
\nthe farmers.<\/p>\n
However, this is not the solution to the challenge of national
\npark protection, or even the problem.<\/p>\n
In fact, there are many other factors threatening protected
\nforests, and the problem of indigenous small holders living in
\nforested areas is certainly not the major one.<\/p>\n
For the moment we shall ponder the reasons why indigenous
\npeople encroach on primary forests.<\/p>\n
Firstly, there is differences between the government's
\ndefinition of a state forest (all forested areas are state
\nforest) and traditional (adat) land claims by the locals.<\/p>\n
There might be some misunderstanding by the local people, why,
\nfor instance, forest concession holders may enter the forest to
\nextract timber along the borders of national parks while they can
\nnot even make a relatively tiny rice field or garden in the same
\nforest.<\/p>\n
It's difficult for the local farmers to understand, why
\nconcession holders from far away can take thousands of logs while
\nthey, the original inhabitants, are not allowed to even a few.<\/p>\n
Secondly, the concept of a national park may be very abstract
\nto farmers who do not know much about the outside world let alone
\nthe meaning of natural resources or biodiversity conservation.<\/p>\n
Thirdly, they do not have much choice if they want to survive,
\nexcept to open up new fields in the forest.<\/p>\n
Actually, it has been proved, that the percentage of fields
\ncut in primary forests by traditional shifting cultivators is
\nvery small compared to that made in secondary forests.<\/p>\n
This is because it is easier to cut down secondary vegetation
\nand fields close to the village are preferred to those far away
\non virgin land.<\/p>\n
Ironically, primary forests become suddenly close to villages,
\nand therefore is easy to cultivate, when roads are created by
\nlogging companies.<\/p>\n
Which kind of farmer, then, is an threat to national parks and
\nresources?<\/p>\n
It is often the market-oriented producer, like those producing
\ncinnamon in the Kerinci-area in Jambi and West Sumatra.<\/p>\n
Actually, these people are often not indigenous inhabitants,
\nbut market-oriented land speculators. Some of them are from Java.<\/p>\n
It is not the traditional farmer who is building large scale
\ncommercial plantations encroaching on the forest for several
\nhundred or thousand hectares.<\/p>\n
This does not mean that traditional settlements do not pose a
\nthreat inside national parks. We can not ignore these people, if
\nonly because they often live under such poor conditions.<\/p>\n
We must be aware that any infrastructure measures, especially
\nthe building of roads, eases the access to forest resources for
\npeople who traditionally do not want to enter.<\/p>\n
This problems is almost impossible to solve by forest rangers
\nbecause the park areas are huge and the facilities for efficient
\npatrols are not sufficient.<\/p>\n
We cannot totally negate the impact of local farmers on the
\nforests in and around national parks. Nevertheless, politicians
\nand officials concerned with park protection should carefully
\nweigh the different factors which pose severe threats to their
\nforests and focus on the most devastating.<\/p>\n
The writer in an geoecologist from the Free University of
\nBerlin, Germany. She recently did her Ph.D research in Indonesia
\nfor the Faculty of Man and Environment at the Technical
\nUniversity of Berlin.<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/national-park-policy-a-conundrum-1447893297",
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