National park to be expanded

National park to be expanded

Theresia Sufa, The Jakarta Post, Bogor

The Gunung Gede Pangrango National Park management will expand
the park, which lies in parts of Bogor, Sukabumi and Cianjur
regencies, due to its value as a water conservation area and a
transit area for rare birds of prey that fly in and out of the
park.

Head of the Bogor conservation unit Memen Suparman told The
Jakarta Post recently that the Ministry of Forestry had evaluated
the forest's function and decided to expand the park from 15,196
hectares to 21,975 hectares. The expansion plan was legalized by
a ministerial decree.

Land clearance inside the conservation area has reached 100
hectares and will therefore require some major rehabilitation,
Memen added.

"The main problem is that we must do some major rehabilitation
to improve the condition of the soil. We will need thousands of
trees for the reforestation and we call on the government to help
in providing them," he said.

An employee at the national park's Bodogol sector, Ujang Edi,
said he was hoping that the forestry ministry would assist with
reforestation.

"This national park is a treasure for everybody in the
country. At present, we are buying the seedlings and trees with
our own monthly salary, which is very small. Due to our idealism,
some of us on staff have even raised funds from the public," he
stated.

Ujang has been one of the most tireless fund raisers for the
rehabilitation program. He managed to get 4,000 trees donated by
elementary students last March, and those have been planted in
the national park's Cibeling sector located in Caringin district,
Bogor regency.

The national park management has another problem with the
Forest Police patrol because of the expansion plan. At present,
the park police are understaffed with only 30 officers for all
four sectors -- Bodogol, Cisarua, Cimande and Bojong Murni -- and
the number of patrol vehicles is very limited.

When the Post was invited on a patrol with them in the Cisarua
sector, an area that used to be an industrial forest managed by
state-run forestry company Perhutani, the damage was very
evident.

The worst conditions are located in the Balekambang block in
Citeko village, Cisarua district, and the Lemah Nended block in
Sukagalih village, Megamendung district, both in Bogor regency.