Ministry urged to speed revitalization of damaged forest

Rendi A. Witular, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Vice president Jusuf Kalla has urged the Ministry of Forestry to fully utilize the massive amount of forest rehabilitation funds -- most of which is currently earning interest in local banks -- to help speed up the revitalization of the country's ailing forestry industry.

The funds are also needed to accelerate efforts to rehabilitate the nation's devastated forests, which according to the ministry, has reached between 31.4 million and 59.2 million hectares.

According to a recent ministry report, the rehabilitation funds, collected since the 1970s from businesspeople holding forest concessions, now amounts to Rp 11 trillion (US$1.17 billion).

"I have ordered the Ministry of Finance to find ways to immediately distribute the idle funds to rehabilitate our forests and help create better forest management," said Kalla in front of business players in the forestry industry on Thursday.

Kalla, however, emphasized the need to boost supervision of the money, as most of it had allegedly been misused by ministry officials, as well as businesspeople in collusion with the ministry.

"Many people are seeking profits from the program. One small example, the price of seeds for certain programs is often inflated from the original price," he explained.

Minister of Forestry Malam Sambat Kaban acknowledged that some officials at his ministry and their private sector partners in the program were seeking as much profit as possible from the program, while ignoring the rehabilitation program.

In fact, that was part of the reason behind the ministry of finance move to not release the money.

"The orientation of people involved in this program is merely profit. We want to change that now by showing that this is a for- profit program, but a social responsibility toward our environment," said Kaban.

This year, the Ministry of Forestry has allocated some Rp 3.2 trillion for restoring some 750,000 hectares of denuded natural forests, up from 251,000 hectares at a cost of Rp 2.3 trillion a year ago.

The 2004 rehabilitation figure is lower than the initial target of 500,000 hectares. In 2003, the ministry managed to restore some 251,000 hectares of forest, far lower than its earlier target of 500,000 hectares.

Kaban said that the ministry was having difficulties in meeting the rehabilitation target, citing inefficiency as a result of corruption, the lack of supervision for the program and poor coordination with the provincial administrations.

Meanwhile, ministry spokesman Transtoto Handhadari said that the plan by the government to immediately use the money for rehabilitation to increase the supply of legal wood available for the companies in the wood-processing sector.

"There is a plan to use some of the funds for industrial plantations so that they can sufficiently supply raw material to local forestry based industry," said Transtoto.

At present, the country's forestry-based industry is facing a shortage of legal raw material because those in charge of replanting are not efficient enough to keep the supply up, which, in turn, increases the demand for illegal wood from across the country.