Environmental Issues in Indonesia - Deforestation and Agricultural Pollution

Deforestation and Agricultural Pollution

A different, but related, set of environmental pressures arose in the 1970s and 1980s among the rice-growing peasants living in the plains and valleys. Rising population densities and the consequent demand for arable land gave rise to serious soil erosion, deforestation due to the need for firewood, and depletion of soil nutrients. Runoff from pesticides polluted water supplies in some areas and poisoned fish ponds. Although national and local governments appeared to be aware of the problem, the need to balance environmental protection with pressing demands of a hungry population and an electorate eager for economic growth did not diminish.

Major problems faced the mountainous interior regions of Kalimantan, Sulawesi and Sumatra. These problems included deforestation, soil erosion, massive forest fires, and even desertification resulting from intensive commercial logging--all these threatened to create environmental disasters. In 1983 some 30,000 km² of prime tropical forest worth at least US$10 billion were destroyed in a fire in Kalimantan Timur Province. The disastrous scale of this fire was made possible by the piles of dead wood left behind by the timber industry. Even discounting the calamitous effects of the fire, in the mid-1980s Indonesia's deforestation rate was the highest in Southeast Asia, at 7,000 km² per year and possibly as much as 10,000 km² per year. Although additional deforestation came about as a result of the government-sponsored Transmigration Program (transmigrasi) in uninhabited woodlands, in some cases the effects of this process were mitigated by replacing the original forest cover with plantation trees, such as coffee, rubber, or palm. In many areas of Kalimantan, however, large sections of forest were cleared, with little or no systematic effort at reforestation. Although reforestation laws existed, they were rarely or only selectively enforced, leaving the bare land exposed to heavy rainfall, leaching, and erosion. Because commercial logging permits were granted from Jakarta, the local inhabitants of the forests had little say about land use, but in the mid-1980s, the government, through the Department of Forestry, joined with the World Bank to develop a forestry management plan. The efforts resulted in the first forest inventory since colonial times, seminal forestry research, conservation and national parks programs, and development of a master plan by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations.

The use of fires to clear land for agriculture has contributed to Indonesia being the world's third largest emitter of greenhouse gases, after China and the United States. Forest fires destroy carbon sinks in old-growth rainforests and peatlands. Efforts to curb carbon emissions, known as Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD), include monitoring of the progression of deforestation in Indonesia and measures to increase incentives for national and local governments to halt it. One such monitoring system is the Center for Global Development's Forest Monitoring for Action platform, which currently displays monthly-updating data on deforestation throughout Indonesia.