Preserving Indonesia's coasts essential for national well-being
Preserving Indonesia's coasts essential for national well-being
Sukristijono Sukardjo, Jakarta
In Indonesia, coasts are home to the highest concentration of
people, ethnically mixed, and provide a natural resource base on
which such a broad range of human activities depends that they
are areas vulnerable to social conflict.
Indonesia is one of the largest maritime countries in the
world. Its coastal zone -- where land meets sea and where fresh
and salt waters mix -- contains many of the earth's most
complex, diverse and productive ecological systems; and is a
treasure trove of diverse natural resources, which make up the
most fundamental elements of the Indonesian environment.
The coastal zones in each of the archipelago's thousands of
islands are unique, ecological and biological domains of vital
importance to a wide array of terrestrial and aquatic life-forms,
including of course humankind; they are amazing habitats/areas
that are never static. Species diversity in coastal environments
differs markedly from those in terrestrial and oceanic systems.
Abundant forage materials and nutrients attract many species
and many species depend upon the coastal habitats for part of
their life-cycle. Many coastal ecosystems depend on finely
balanced nutrient supplies. They are fragile systems that are
always destroyed or impaired by pollutants. Individual species
such as a fish and shellfish thrive in the habitats and
ecosystems -- coral reefs, seagrass beds, mangroves, wetlands and
tidelands, estuaries, and beaches -- found on our coasts. Here,
our fishery resources are spawned and nurtured, offering nursery,
feeding and breeding habitats for many marine species.
Deforestation and agricultural activities occurring far inland
can also give rise to the pollution of coastal systems through
siltation and run-off of fertilizer and pesticides -- Jakarta Bay
being a prime example. Land-based pollution accounts for over 75
percent of marine pollution in Indonesia and is generated by both
urban and rural land use. These areas support our economy and
literally feed the nation.
Over-fishing, over-exploitation, and pollution are putting a
tremendous strain on our coastal resources, however, resulting in
the loss of fishery habitats, water quality, and various types of
marine life from corals, seagrasses to mangroves to fishes.
If our coastal environment is not conserved or managed well,
resource-use conflicts and threats to food security will
inevitably add to our country's social and economic development
problems.
Already vulnerable to natural phenomena such as tsunami,
typhoons, cyclones and coastal storms, our coastal communities
are facing an even greater risk from all kinds of unmanaged and
potentially harmful human activities. The unrestrained pursuit of
multiple activities in coastal zones inevitably leads to
competition for finite resources, environmental degradation and
often environmental and social conflict, like in Buyat Bay, in
North Sulawesi, and Jakarta Bay.
Furthermore, development practices that ignore the dynamics of
coastal systems island-by-island can be catastrophic, as
evidenced by the increasing loss of lives, property and
investment due to coastal flooding and erosion. The destruction
of natural barriers to coastal flooding -- reefs, mangroves and
dunes -- further increases the vulnerability of coastal
populations, as does localized land subsidence, which may be
induced by large-scale extraction of ground water, oil and gas.
Further threats of sea-level rises and other possible impacts of
global warming are also in our face.
Open access to coastal resources has resulted in over-fishing.
Dynamite fishing, cyanide poisoning, industrial pollution,
domestic waste, and siltation are destroying our coastal reefs
and seagrass beds. Our mangrove forests are being converted into
fishponds, beach resorts, and residential and industrial estates,
further reducing the natural habitats of various fish, shellfish,
and crustaceans found in our coastal zones.
The result: a declining fish catch, which has already led to a
situation where most fishing activities are becoming economically
unviable. Thousands of hectares of the waterlogged coastal zone
resources have been lost country-wide in unsustainable
development programs. More are going, and this is unfortunate
because it is now known that these so-called "wastelands" are a
resource as valuable as good farmland and, in their own unique
way, equally productive.
Despite widespread coastal degradation in Indonesia,
opportunities still exist for sustainable development and for
remedial action in heavily impacted areas -- Aceh, North Sumatra
and Nias.
A prerequisite, however, is a genuine commitment to coastal
management, not just by governments (provincial and central), but
also by the multitude of users and beneficiaries of coastal
resources. Reconciling coastal conflicts will require measures
that are more integrated, adaptive, system-oriented and far-
sighted than the sector approaches commonly adopted.
Community participation is therefore an inherent and integral
part of good government.
In Indonesia, coastal environments should be of primary
importance in the biosphere reserve program. It is tempting to
propose a locked-gate management strategy in which all human
activity is precluded, thus permitting nature to take its course;
however, because the biosphere reserves will include coastal
areas not free of man's influence or devoid of potential
commercial value, they will fail to meet the criteria for island
isolation.
Management strategy for coastal areas should be based on the
principle that the natural range and scale of physical processes
must remain unchecked within the biosphere reserves.
At the national and local (provincial and district) levels,
the development of broad-scale resource and use policies is
important -- including coast- and exclusive environmental zone
-specific environmental legislation and economic incentives and
disincentives.
Policies on human populations nationally may also need to be
modified, and therefore birth control programs should be
intensified up to the district level. These programs should be
considered a major part of integrated coastal zone management in
Indonesia.
The writer is professor in mangrove ecology at the Center for
Oceanological Research and Development, Indonesian Institute of
Sciences, Jakarta.