Villagers survive by chopping down mangrove forests
Villagers survive by chopping down mangrove forests
By Prapti Widinugraheni
LANGSA, Aceh (JP): Ridwan, 40, has just returned from
harvesting several mangrove trees. It took him four hours to find
trees of the appropriate size, two hours to do the cutting and
another four hours to return home.
His harvest was good this time. Together with Usu, 35, he
managed to fill their 2.5-meter long and .5-meter wide boat.
When he reaches his village, Tanjung Keramat, he hands over
the wood to a coal kiln and receives his wage of Rp 10,000
(US$4.30) -- a reward for the full boat -- before heading home to
his family of eight children.
"I don't know what I'd do if there were no more trees to cut.
It would be very difficult. What would we eat?" he asks.
Ridwan, Usu and Yahmin, 45, are among the thousands of local
people who claim they would suffer if cutting mangrove trees in
East Aceh was banned by the local administration.
They insist, however, that if they had a choice they would
willingly give another job a try.
"I suppose the government would know where to move us. The
important thing is that we will have something to feed the mouths
at home every day," says Ridwan.
The three villagers say they don't have strong ties with kiln
companies in the area.
The only thing that keeps them working for the kilns, they
say, is the debts they owe the kilns' owners -- people they call
tauke.
"Even before we were employed, the tauke would lend us money.
We repay the debts with our daily wage," says Yahmin.
"Ninety-nine percent of us have loans to the tauke," Ridwan
adds.
Asked whether they were aware of the high prices of mangrove-
wood coal on the market, the three say they only know that the
tauke pay Rp 250 to Rp 300 for each kilogram of coal produced by
the kilns.
Ridwan, Yahmin and Usu don't know that the tauke can sell
high-quality coal from mangrove wood -- which is mainly exported
to Europe -- for more than Rp 750 a kilogram, according to a
local government official.
The coal kilns operating in the area, according to officials
of the local administration, are illegal (although there are
reportedly "official" fees levied for the coal produced) and the
mangrove forests are guarded by patrols.
"We seldom have problems with patrol officers, who come from
the police and the Army. Usually they chase us around near the
holiday seasons, like Idul Fitri, and seize our equipment. But
they never do anything else," Ridwan says.
Yahmin says that once the equipment is seized, their tauke
"bail" the equipment out and return it to the workers.
"It doesn't take long, it's just a matter of days," he says.
Yahmin says there is nothing the workers can do once the
patrols approach them.
"We have no legal papers, no permits. There is no way of
escaping them," he explains.
A little further away from the river lives Askar, a 25-year-
old father of one who manages a kiln. He is paid Rp 300,000 a
month by the tauke to watch over the coal kiln owned by a distant
relative.
One six by six-meter kiln, he says, can produce 18 tons of
coal in a single firing which can last up to one and a half
months to produce quality coal.
"Its hard work and it gets our clothes filthy. But it would be
worse if we weren't allowed to cut the trees. Its our only source
of income," he says.
He doesn't have much to worry about, no ban has been imposed.
And so the kilns continue to operate and Ridwan and his pals
carry on supplying the kilns with mangrove wood.