Questioning reforestation fund
Questioning reforestation fund
From Koran Tempo
As reported in The Jakarta Post on May 21, the secretary- general of the Ministry of Forestry, Wahjudi Wardojo, made several conflicting statements in a hearing with Commission III of the House of Representatives on May 20.
While our forest areas are diminishing, the reforestation fund of Rp 10,875 trillion has just vanished into thin air. On paper, part of this fund -- Rp 8,426 trillion -- has gone to the account of the minister of finance. Then Rp 2,360 trillion has been deposited at the state's treasury office. Another sum -- Rp 1,653 trillion -- has been transferred to the account of the minister of forestry. The total amount is quite huge: Rp 12,349 trillion.
On the one hand, the government -- in this case the ministry of forestry -- talks about the deterioration of our forest areas but on the other hand, the reforestation program has been progressing very, very slowly. In the hearing, Wardojo warned that the reforestation fund should be carefully spent as otherwise it would be used up in four to five years. The question is why there should be any worry if the money is wholly spent on reforestation.
In the hearing, Wardojo said that the fund was also allocated to finance other activities of the ministry of forestry, restructuring of forestry businesses, control over illegal logging and some other projects. As the fund is not fully designated for reforestation purposes, the easiest way to reduce forest damage will be to cut down on the annual logging allotment for official forest concessionaires.
On the occasion, Wardojo told the legislators that the official logging allotment for forest concessionaires had been reduced to 5.7 million m3 in 2004 from 6.8 million m3 in 2003, 12 million m3 in 2002 and 21 million m3 in 2001. One big question is what has been done about illegal loggers.
When forest concessionaires fail to pay their reforestation fund, the government can easily refuse to issue a certificate stating that certain forest produce is legal or refuse to approve their annual working scheme. The question is what has the government done about the illegal logging bosses regarding the collection of the reforestation fund.
DEHEN BINTI Banjarmasin South Kalimantan