"Getting the message out"

The Malinau survey provided significant insight into "what is important to communities living in tropical forest landscapes”. The MLA team wanted to give back this information to the Malinau communities and help them communicate their needs to other local stakeholders.

We first prepared four posters and a set of playing cards for that purpose and later produced a film. Our information also contributed to the new environmental education curriculum for the district.

Environmental education materials

Survey results also contributed to an environmental education curriculum, which was developed in 2004 by the Education service of Malinau district, with assistance from WWF Kayan Mentarang.

By way of stories, children are taught about the specific environment they live in, its resources, use and problems of management there might be.

See here for some sample pages of the books.

The CIFOR-MLA team is grateful for a World Bank grant that allowed us to develop this website and the above set of dissemination materials for local stakeholders.

Environmental education booklets for Malinau district

Since 2000, the Education Services of district governments, are allowed to determine the content of education for several subjects. One of these is environmental education, and WWF-Kayan Mentarang was quick to take the opportunity to assist local governments with developing a curriculum.

These are pages from the environmental education book for grade X. The first chapter is about water.
The story and the drawing tell about special places in the forest, where salty water comes to the surface.

This attracts wild animals, who are often short of minerals. Local people know this and if they want to hunt and animal for food, they can come to these places and wait for an animal to come.

This page comes from the chapter on Water in the 6th grade book. It tells the story about the Pelian fish (Tor tambra), which is the fish that people like most in the Malinau area. It is a large fish, with nice tasting meat and few bones. It also has a cultural value, especially for the Merap people, who say that a family that has just had a new baby should cook and decorate the fish with colorful beans as devotion to their ancestors.