Better welfare won't stop deforestation

Better welfare won't stop deforestation

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Improving the economic welfare of communities living in forested
areas would do little to reduce the widespread illegal logging
across the country, environmentalists say.

Director of the Indonesian Center for Environmental Law
(ICEL) Indro Sugianto said the most effective way to combat
illegal logging was to develop an integrated law enforcement
system to use against the logging "mafia", which was known to be
backed by elements in government and the security forces.

However, Indro said the poor economic conditions of people
living at or near forests had contributed to illegal logging.

"In some cases, illegal logging is a systematic process -- and
certain parties use the desire of people to improve their welfare
to lure the poor into (logging) for their profit," he said on
Wednesday.

Earlier on Tuesday, the United Nations Development Program
(UNDP), in coordination with the European Commission (EC),
launched a joint program aiming to preserve tropical forests and
reduce illegal logging practices by raising the living standards
of local communities.

The EC allocated around 1.2 million Euro (Rp 15.5 billion) for
the Small Grants Program for Operations to Promote Tropical
Forests (SGP PTF) for a two-year term. The program would cover
forested areas in Java, South Sumatra and Central Sulawesi.

The grant would be used to pay for livelihood-based projects
designed to reduce poverty among the local people often blamed
for taking part in illegal logging.

Data from the Forestry Information Center shows that the rate
of deforestation increased from 1.6 million to 1.8 million
hectares per year between 1985 and 1997, to more than 2.83
million hectares between 1998 and 2000; 80 percent of which was
due to illegal logging.

If the trend continued, there would be no forests left by 2010
in Kalimantan and North Sumatra, the World Bank has predicted.

Environment activists said the fight against illegal logging
would be a long one because it was supported by endemic
corruption at all levels of government and law enforcement.

The high domestic and international demand for timber also
contributed to the increase in illegal logging cases, they said.

Luca Tacconi, a senior economist at the Center for
International Forestry Research (CIFOR), said the improved
welfare of local communities would not stop them from illegally
logging the forests until the law was firmly enforced against the
perpetrators.

"We need to look at complementary measures such as the law,
economic situations and the right to forest use," he said.

He said an effective monitoring system that could track
changes in deforestation and getting the community involved in
managing the forests were two measures that could help reduce
illegal logging.

The executive secretary of the Alliance of Indonesian
Traditional Communities, Emil Kleben, said the main problem with
illegal logging was people's misconception about forest use.

"Urban people equalize the forests with the economy because
they see only the trees. For tribal communities, forests are the
source of life, religion and the economy," he said.

Commenting on the UNDP-EC's program, Elil said, "It will be
successful if it pushes the communities to take their own
initiatives in forest conservation and not narrow the problems
down to economics, which are only advantageous to certain
individuals." (005)