Journal of Earth Science & Climatic Change
Open Access

Abstract

Peatland in Riau, Sumatra, Indonesia was seriously degraded especially after the 1990s because of the large-scale drainage brought about by timber and oil palm plantations large-scale drainage at peat swamp forest. These fires contributed seriously to the global warming. Fires started the fire at the peat swamp forest at the research site in Bengkalsi District Riau Province, Sumatra Indonesia at the beginning of the 2000s. Seeing the fire broken out at the peat swamp forest, people started illegal logging at the forest, and exported timber to Malaysia. People distributed the land after the logging, and planted oil palm there. These plants needed drainage because oil palms cannot grow at the wetland. These oil palm planting and drainage promote further fire and degradation of peatland. These phenomena can be explained by the theory of market failure, and community failure. The company did not quickly extinguish the fire outside of their concession or made the facilities to curb the fire. The company did not bear the social cost incurred from its activities of timber plantation construction. The community did not care about their forest so that forest could be protected from fire, but promoted further deforestation. The majority of the land was state forest. But starting serious fire in 2000’s, the Government could not curb the fire brought out there. These situations started to change. In 2009, the company started to support the Fire Caring Community (MPA) by supplying some salaries to the members. In 2016 the Government set up the Peatland Restoration Agency (BRG), and started many activities such as the program of Petland Care Village (Desa Peduli Gambut) Many organizations and program such as JICA, WWF, and Village Fund constructed many small-scale dams to promote the rewetting. In 2019, the company started to distribute water to the down stream area of the village during the dry season. These efforts by community, company and the Government change the situation so that frequency of fire decreased. Those efforts should be continued.

Biography

Dr. Kosuke Mizuno is a professor of development studies at School of Environmental Science, University of Indonesia (SIL). He is also an emeritus professor Center for Southeast Asian Studies (CSEAS), Kyoto University, and a visiting professor at the Research Institute for Humanity and Nature (RIHN). After working at the Institute of Developing Economies (IDE), he joined the Center for Southeast Asian Area Studies, Kyoto University in 1996. He has studied on Indonesian economy from the viewpoint of people’s organizations, institutions and economic development in democratizing Indonesia based on extensive field works focusing on land, labor and capital. His publication includes Rural Industrialization in Indonesia, a Study on Community-based Weaving Industry in West Java (Institute of Developing Economies) in 1996, Catastrophe and Regeneration in Indonesia’s Peatlands: Ecology, Economy and Society, (NUS Press) in 2016, Sustainability and Crisis at the Village: Agroforestry in West Java, Indonesia. (the Talun-Huma system and rural social economy) (UGM Press) in 2016.