Management of teak forests

Management of teak forests

From Media Indonesia

At the beginning of the month, I went to Singapore and Malaysia. Traveling by bus from Johor Baru to Kuala Lumpur along a 324-kilometer-long toll road, I saw on both sides of the road some 650,000 well-looked-after teak trees that were about five years old and an average height of between 9 meters and 12 meters. Millions of teak trees have been planted all over Malaysia.

In Indonesia, teak trees are illegally felled at a very young age and they are not planted en masse. If the government fails to pay proper attention to these trees, the young generation will have to go abroad to see them.

The Indonesian government should learn from the Malaysian government about how to make use of less productive land for teak trees.

Unless the Indonesian government acts now, teak craftsmen in Blora, for example, will have to import teak wood from Malaysia some 15 to 20 years from now.

In the early 1970s, Malaysia invited Indonesia's academics to teach in Malaysia but now we need them here. Do not let this condition recur in the case of teak wood.

IRMAL Jakarta