Collaborative forest management of teak forest in Central Java

BACKGROUND

Java is a highly populated island in Indonesia. Although the total area of Java is only 6.5% of the total area of Indonesia, around 64% of the total population of Indonesia lives on this island. The total state forest area in Java is 2.9 million ha. It is estimated that a total of 35 millions people, of 6200 villages, interact with and depend on these forests in one way or the other. Most of the villages that surround state forests are poor villages. The villagers have limited employment opportunities, most of the workers are over working age, there is a shortage of land available for agricultural activities and the average land ownership is 0.25 ha per family.

Although Perhutani provides limited employment opportunities and cash income for the villagers, it cannot be guaranteed that they can improve their lives if they participate in Perhutani forest management activities only through daily labouring work. Several programs and activities which aim to improve people’s welfare have been undertaken by Perhutani since 1972, unfortunately failed to meet their objectives. The reasons for these failures include the lack of Perhutani’s understanding of the social dynamics and local political processes in the village and national levels. Further, poverty and lack of people’s participation has led to illegal logging activities in the period of 1998 to 2000.

In 2001, Perhutani came up with a new program called Collaborative Forest Management (PHBM or Pengelolaan Hutan Bersama Masyarakat). The main characteristic of PHBM is the willingness of Perhutani to empower local community organizations at the village level so that they can engage in forest management in collaboration with Perhutani and other stakeholders.

The aims of PHBM are in line with those of the LPF project, where multi-stakeholders with different views and power manage the forests together.

LPF research activities on PHBM were carried out in two forest districts (locally called KPH or Kesatuan Pemangkuan Hutan), where 2 villages of each of the forest districts were selected as a project site, i.e. Surajaya Village and Glandang Village in KPH Pemalang, and Tanggel Village and Gempol Village in KPH Randublatung.