Learning from the Riau Forests
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The natural forests of Riau are being lost at an astonishing
rate. In just one decade, more than 3.7 million hectares of forests
were destroyed in the province from a total forest area of 6.4
million hectares. By 2005, just 2.7 hectares, less than 33 percent
of the forest area of Riau remained. The majority of the remaining
forests were in peat forest areas with a peat depth of more than 3
meters.
The timber processing industry is the culprit behind
the decline in Riau’s natural forests. In 2000, there were 312 units
of forestry industry in Riau with an average production capacity of
49,000 tons/year, which is equivalent to 15.8 million m3/year. At
the same time, the capacity of the forests to sustainably supply raw
material was only 1.1 million m3/year.
Strangely enough, the
Riau Province Regional Forestry Office recorded increases in the
quantity and capacity of forestry industry in 2005 to 576 units with
a total raw material production of 22.7 million m3/year. This is
extremely surprising. How is it possible, with such a large
discrepancy between supply and demand, that the Riau Regional
Forestry Office instead increased production capacity by granting
more than 200 extraction licenses for the continuation and expansion
of logging? |
Of the total 22.7 million cubic meters of timber
needed to fulfill industrial needs in Riau, about 17.92 million
cubic meters is destined for the two largest pulp industries in
Indonesia, RAPP (APRIL Group) and IKPP (APP Group).
Why do
they need so much? This has occurred because these two industries
have made no serious attempt to develop their Industrial Timber
Estates, while at the same time massively expanding their pulp and
paper mill facilities. In October 2003, the Megawati era Minister
for Forestry, M. Prakosa, stated that many pulp and paper plants
were obtaining illegal timber for their raw materials, “Many pulp
and paper industries use raw materials not only from Industrial
Timber Estates, but also from the natural forests or even accept
illegal timber. The greed of industry for raw materials thus has the
potential to become a factor in forest destruction. Pulp and paper
industries should not be short of raw materials if they planted
Industrial Timber Estates according to schedules based on the needs
of the industry that they manage.”
In discussions with
representatives from a number of local NGOs, one of the IKPP finance
staff arrogantly stated:
“We are in no hurry to
establish Acacia plantations as long as cheap mixed timber supply is
still available. Why must we exchange these with Acacia? We have
access to cheap raw materials. Establishing Acacia plantations not
only requires a lot of funds, but is also full of risks. The Acacia
plantation that we are establishing now is no different to an
insurance policy. We will cash it in when timber supplies from the
natural forests are no longer available.”
Ironically, these
two companies control 1,544,220 hectares of natural forests and an
additional 388,821 hectares through companies that are directly
affiliated with them. Less than 350,000 hectares of the 1.8 million
hectares they control (21% of the total land area of Riau) has been
re-planted. It is a fact that these two companies lack serious
intent to establish plantations, even though Indah Kiat has been in
operation since 1983 and RAPP since 1994. It becomes even more
absurd when these two industries acknowledge that the average age of
their plantations is just 6 years.
Since establishment twenty
years ago, Indah Kiat has built up to the production level of 2
million tons of pulp each year. RAPP has achieved a similar level of
annual production. The two share forest timber from a total 1.8
million hectares of official concessions. More than half is in a
zone where conversion is prohibited according to forestry
regulations. Two of the four concessions owned by RAPP, for example,
are under principle licenses. However, RAPP has carried out logging
in these zones despite the fact that the Department of Forestry has
yet to issue definitive licenses.
The use of illegally logged
timber? These two industries, especially Indah Kiat, are highly
skilled. At the end of 2003, it was discovered that one of IKPP
affiliates, PT Mapala Rabda, had destroyed natural forests up to 1.3
kilometers from the western boundary of its concession. More than
57,200 m3 were illegally obtained through this practice. At the same
year, PT Tuah Sekato carried out illegal logging on 200 hectares of
land east of its concession. From this practice, IKPP automatically
received 22,000 m3 of “free timber”. Also that year, Arara Abadi
carried out illegal logging in Giam Siak Kecil Wildlife Reserve.
They provided more than 76,000 m3 of “free timber” to IKPP within a
brief time.
The Sinar Mas Group-owned company was also
responsible for the destruction of 11,200 hectares of forests in
Giam Siak Kecil Wildlife Reserve, which has an area of 55,000
hectares. They then brought the stolen timber through a logpond
owned by Arara Abadi so that it appeared to originate from Arara
Abadi. Close to Pekanbaru, the capital of Riau Province, IKPP was
responsible for the destruction of 4,800-6,000 hectares of the
TAHURA Minas conservation zone. More than 80% of timber cut
illegally in the conservation zone passed through the gates of IKPP
while the remainder headed to the Rusna Sawmill in Pekanbaru. IKPP
harvested the following timber species from these locations:
Meranti, Kempas, Cengel, Merbau, Kulim, Semenai, Cimpur, Rengas and
Gaharu (6000 logs). All this timber was taken directly to IKPP using
trucks with police plates: BM 9392 AA, BM 9581 AT, BM 9502 AA and BM
9316 AM.
The modus operandi of RAPP was quite different to
Indah Kiat. Also shown to have purchased and used illegal timber,
this APRIL Group company actually entered areas where conversion was
prohibited according to law. Law No. 41/1999 states that only areas
with sparse (cleared) forests and barren land can be converted into
Industrial Timber Estates. Similarly, Presidential Decree 32/90 and
Governmental Regulation 47/97 state that all peat forest areas with
a depth of more than three meters are protected from logging and
conversion. However, it seems that regulations are merely paper
regulations. The majority of APRIL/RAPP concessions are in forest
areas with high vegetative density or in peat forest areas that have
peat depths of more than three meters.
Sowing
Disaster
Starting with the desire to carry out
rehabilitation of areas damaged by industrial logging, and to beome
a major player in the pulp and paper market, the Indonesian
Government established a forestry program called Industrial Timber
Estate and Pulp and Paper Industry Development in the early
1980s.
Dozens of regulations giving special rights to
companies were soon passed. These facilitated destructive logging
practices on the premise that they would ensure the success of the
Government Industrial Timber Estate development program. The
Government then injected reforestation funds worth hundreds of
billions of rupiah into the Industrial Timber Estates. Of the 8
million hectares made available for Industrial Timber Estate
development in 2001 that were given to about 175 companies, 5
million hectares were to be planted with the pulp and paper crops,
Acacia mangium and Eucalyptus. This shifted Indonesia’s position
from being a net pulp importer to being a net pulp exporter. On the
other hand, the apparent quantity of Industrial Timber Estates and
pulp and paper industry is a utopia that has created a chain of
disasters for the environment and community life, economically,
socially and politically.
A Chain of Interconnected
Problems
Good at Damaging Things, Reluctant to Fix
Them
There are no relevant arguments for claiming
that the Industrial Timber Estates and pulp and paper industries are
efficient or productive industries. From the available official
data, only 1.85 million hectares (23.5%) have been planted. Of
course, this figure declines when compared with the reality in the
field because Industrial Timber Estates are frequently planted in
areas where healthy growth is unlikely, for example in peatforests
and swamps (for instance, the odds of seedling survival for APP in
peat forests in Jambi are 1:3, meaning that for every 3 seedlings
planted in the swamp, only 1 is able to grow).
Moreover,
conversion of peat forest areas also gives rise to another serious
threat. Industrial Timber Estates planted in peat forest areas
fragment the area into small rivers (for instance in Riau, 129,000
ha of peat forests have been converted into Acacia plantations and
more than 245,000 ha. are destined for the same fate according to
Riau Spatial Plan 2001-2015). The objective of this is to facilitate
transportation from one region to another as well as to reduce the
acidity of the peat forest. These threats to the peat forests are
irreversible. Peat soils store a large quantity of moisture, but
does not have the capacity to capture or store groundwater. Close to
sea level, drained peat soils will become filled with seawater.
Industrial Timber Estate companies do not manage their plantations
well. In 2002, the Government retracted licenses from several
Industrial Timber Estate companies, for reasons ranging from
problematic debt, mismanagement, to abuse of Reforestation Funds.
Although this has led to legal polemic, it also proves that the
performance of Industrial Timber Estate companies is very
poor.
Ironically, logged lands are often abandoned by
Industrial Timber Estate companies. There are consequently millions
of hectares of land in Indonesia that were formerly healthy forests
and the basis for livelihoods of customary communities, that have
been damaged and destroyed to supply pulp and paper companies.
In turn, the environmental functions of these regions have declined.
Thus, when environmental pressure increases due to structural
environmental destruction either upstream or downstream, natural
disasters such as floods, fires and landslides
result.
Balancing Raw Materials and Natural
Forests
The seven pulp and paper industries in
Sumatra and Kalimantan require about 27.7 million cubic meters per
year. There are no facts or data showing that these companies avoid
wood from natural forests. Up until 2006, more than 78 percent of
the wood demand of these mills was supplied by natural forests. This
was not merely an imbalance between raw materials and industrial
capacity – the scales have come unstuck.
The situation has a
foregone conclusion – the pulp and paper industries will continue to
fulfill their raw material needs by cutting down natural forests. In
March and April 2004, Indonesian national newspapers ran stories in
which APP and APRIL declared that they would cease using raw
materials from the natural forests in 2007 and 2008. Yet, this year
we have witnessed more than 70% of their raw materials still being
sourced from natural forests. IKPP argue that their Acacia plants
are too immature because they are aged only 1 to 6 years old. After
more than 24 years of operation in Riau, this argument is of course
absurd.
Building a Pyramid of Social
Conflict
The authoritarian system established by
administrators to manage the forestry sector has led to a lack of
transparency in the system for awarding Industrial Timber Estate
concessions, such that this has become full of corruption, collusion
and nepotism. Dispensations provided by recent Ministers for
Forestry to companies have not passed audits and some occur in peat
forest areas in Riau that are categorized as protected.
On a
more technical level, the determination of concession zones pays no
heed to customary or local community rights, and therefore leads to
conflicts that end in social conflict, which proliferate parallel to
the development of Industrial Timber Estates and pulp industry.
During the 1990-1996 period, more than 5,700 conflicts directly
related to Industrial Timber Estates development (source: Department
of Forestry, re-processed by LATIN) in all corners of Indonesia. The
modus of conflict was dominated by rivalry between communities and
companies over rights to land, as well as lack of clarity on the
part of the Government itself over the use of Reforestation Funds by
companies.
In Porsea, North Sumatra, conflicts between the
Porsea community and PT Inti Indorayon Utama (IIU) led to violence
against the people by administrators who colluded with businessmen.
Hundreds of people were assaulted, some were disabled for life,
dozens were imprisoned, and several were killed. In addition, PT IIU
ruined the harmony of the Porsea people with the environment. The
air around the factory was contaminated by chlorinated smoke that
damaged people’s lungs, and community paddy fields became
infiltrated by liquid waste from the factory.
Although PT IIU
was subsequently closed, the legal chaos and complexity of
conflicting political interests resulted in re-opening by a business
group under the flag of Radja Garuda Mas. By buying the rhetoric of
a new paradigm, new company name (PT Toba Pulp Lestari), and the
claim that they would no longer produce rayon but only pulp,
President Megawati not only blessed the renewed cranking of the PT
TPL machines, but also turned a blind eye to violence by the state
agencies (military and police) against the people of
Porsea.
APP had another trick for handling their social
conflicts, by forming a private security force (a type of militia
funded by the company, with members recruited from the surrounding
community who had intimidating physical strength). The Mandiangan
community in Riau received a taste of just how vicious the physical
violence of the private security forces could be when they demanded
a resolution to their land conflict with PT IKPP.
RAPP
(APRIL) has even used the military and police to resolve their
prolonged conflict with local communities over land ownership. In
Jambi, PT Lontar Papyrus (PT LPPI) and PT Wira Karya Sakti (PT WKS)
succeeded in using their influence to manipulate these conflicts and
the implementation of Government regulations. For example, in Parit
Pudin village, an area allocated for agricultural land was converted
to Industrial Timber Estate by PT WKS.
At this point, the
red line is that the pyramid of social conflict due to the presence
of pulp industry and Industrial Timber Estate development is not
just the ultimate consequence of the chain of Industrial Timber
Estate and pulp industry development, but represents a vicious cycle
of structural and systematic policies created by companies and
Government, and a paradigm of natural resource management and
conflict management that positions nature and poor rural communities
as the objects of suffering.
The Tangled Thread of
Policy
Excessive expectations of the pulp and paper
industries’ brilliance has made the Government willing to infringe
the rules of its own policies. A licensing system that lacks
transparency and favors the interests of companies is still
supported by the capital incentive of zero percent interest rates.
The case of PT Menara Hutan Buana (PT MHB) in South Kalimantan is a
spectacular example. More than 40 billion rupiah in State funds have
been lost because of PT MHB’s manipulation of its own Industrial
Timber Estate.
Actually, the problem of blocked credit and
manipulation of Government Funds has become a general case among
Industrial Timber Estate companies. Unfortunately, although cases of
manipulation and blocked credit are rife among Industrial Timber
Estate companies and pulp industries and have become a bad
precedent, the Government has never regarded this as a valuable
experience and conducted a comprehensive review of pulp and paper
industry and Industrial Timber Estate policies. The Government has
instead continued to produce policies that benefits
companies.
At the end of 2003, the Government through the
Department of Forestry discussed regulations related to Industrial
Timber Estates at a Ministerial level. The Decree of the Minister
was launched publicly and, ironically, the regulations were thick
with special rights and “amnesties” for the Industrial Timber Estate
companies. In these regulations, it is stated that an Industrial
Timber Estate company can be established without prior evaluation of
its suitability, which is the same as ignoring the poor performance
record of the Industrial Timber Estates and paving the way for
industry pragmatism towards the environment and other socio-economic
problems. In addition, Industrial Timber Estate companies that are
already well-off or are in critical condition are given the
opportunity to change their capital structures by divestment.
Through the Government Capital Addenda scheme, this lays public
funds on the line because if divestment is carried out through the
sale of assets or shares by the Industrial Timber Estate companies
to private parties, public funds shift to private
ownership.
The Government’s own paradigm of forestry
management is still fixated on commercialization. In the section on
Land Rehabilitation in the Forestry Strategy Plan, the concept of
Industrial Timber Estate development is clearly still depicted as
the solution to the problem of land damaged by timber and plantation
industry exploitation.
Problems Ending in Structural
Disasters
The cycle of pulp and paper industry and
Industrial Timber Estate problems exacerbate a problem
suffered by the Indonesian people and environment – natural
disasters that are becoming more destructive and widespread each
day. The slipshod performance of Industrial Timber Estate companies
offers up neglected land or plantations that increase emissions of
greenhouse gasses. Industrial Timber Estates are planted on peat
forest swamps and thus ruin the water and mud sedimentation cycle,
and the canal system is not organized well. In Jambi, the Mendahara
Ulu people now number among those who “enjoy” floods because the
downstream mangrove forests have been cut down by Industrial Timber
Estate companies.
In Riau, 2003 began with severe floods that
continued for almost a month. These destroyed all in their path and
caused losses of Rp. 764 billion, which is equivalent to 64% of the
Riau 2002 regional budget. The analysis of WALHI Riau showed how the
quantity of upstream forest conversion was the main factor in the
loss of soil anchoring strength. After the floods, forest fires
burnt out more than 245,000 ha in no more than 23 days. Of the 54
companies that carried out burning (Bapedalda Riau, 2003), 32 were
recorded as being in Industrial Forest Estate
plantations.
Disasters, whether they be floods, landslides,
fire and smoke, are not the culmination of natural processes, but
are more the product of an exploitative environmental management
system, with policies that prioritize economic rent and disregard
aspects of environmental sustainability and conservation. Clearly,
this is a structural disaster, a disaster that is created by a
handful of policy entities, superstructure and the corrupt behavior
of the State apparatus. The problems of the pulp and paper industry
and Industrial Timber Estates must therefore be viewed with an
understanding of non-forestry sector domains, both those essentially
related and those which have no apparent direct relation to forestry
problems.
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(http://www.eng.walhi.or.id/)
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