Illegal logging in protected area and buffer zone support programs:
Case Study of Gunung Palung National Park, West Kalimantan
ONDA Nariaki, KATO Shogo, H. R. PUTRO & MASUDA Misa
1. Background
Illegal logging is the biggest problem of forest and forestry in Indonesia. It has been known that official
production figures on timber output from Indonesian’s forests have been far from accurate (Anne 2002).
Also in the conservation area, it is carried out unexceptional. In Indonesia the first, five national parks
established in 1980, and, it has come to count 41 places in 2003. But, it has been known that many problems
of management after the decentralization.
R. Soekmadi (2002) pointed out that “natural resource dependent people”, ”land conflict”, and “lack of law
enforcement” as major problem for managing all national parks in Indonesia. He mentioned that
appropriate forest management is needed. In addition, he mentioned that “land hunger”, “law enforcement”,
“lack of appreciation from local people” and “illegal logging” is an urgent issue that needs to be tackled in
Gunung Palung National Park (GPNP) of West Kalimantan Province. Thus, GPNP Office (Unit Gunung
Palung National Park: UGPNP) and local government developed a buffer zone support program for the
national park. The aim of this paper is to find out the effectiveness of the buffer zone support program in
natural conservation area.
2. Background Descriptions
2.1. Detail of GPNP
Initially in 1937,the park was a natural and wildlife preservation with its area of 37,750 ha. Pekayang,
Sebruang Mountains, Labuhan Batu and the surrounding area comprising 60,000 ha were then merged with
Gunung Palung Wildlife Sanctuary in 1981. As a result, land area increased to 97,750 ha. However, when
the Ministry of Forestry decelerated the GPNP, the area decreased to 90,000 ha.
The GPNP is located in the Ketapang District in West Kalimantan Province at 1°03' – 1°22' SL, and 109°54'
- 110°28' EL (Figure 16.1). The GPNP overlaps in five sub districts which are Sukadana, Matan Hilir Utara,
Figure 16.1.
Study Site: Gunung Palung National ParkFigure 16.2.
Gunung Palung National ParkProtected areas in Gunung Palung National Park contain seven eco-system types. The first eco-system is
sub-alpine rainforest. It is located at Mt. Palung (1,116m) and Mt. Panti (1,050m). The second eco-system is
mountain rain forest. The third eco-system is lowland rain forest. The forth eco-system is alluvial land forest.
The fifth is swamp forest. The sixth is mangrove forest, and the last is rheophyte forest.
The GPNP eco-system is also a habitat for rare and frequently endangered fauna including oranghutan
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(Pstittacula longicauda), ivory hornbill (Renophax vigil), vampire bat (Ptereropus vampyrus), clouded leopard (Neofelis nebulosa) , and sun bear (Helarctos malayanus).
㻃
Figure 16.3.
Orangutan (August 2003)Figure 16.4.
Nest of orangutan (August 2003)The UGPNP has responsibility to manage GPNP and support the welfare of the people who live in the buffer
zone. In 2002, the UGPNP was formally decided by the decree of the Minister of Forestry. The main
office was in Ketapang with its branches in Sukadana and Teluk Melano. However, the decree has not been
carried out yet. At present Ketapang, the main office, still has four branches; Sukadana, Kebin, Batu Barat
and Pangkal Tapang in the border of GPNP. Seventy-eight people work in UGPNP, which consist of 5
administrative officers, 27 foresters, 41 forest policemen and 5 office workers in 2004. In 2004, the number
of worker in the branch decreased. The area that was patrolled by the 4 branches was 90,000 ha. But,
there were only one forest police and one forester in each branch.
Over ten years have passed after the establishment of the GPNP. However, the zoning system inside the
national park, prescribed by the Conservation of Nature Law in 1995, has not carried out.
2.2. Buffer zone support programs
Before decentralization, the GPNP office mainly implemented the buffer zone support program. From 1996
to 2001, the buffer zone support program was carried out by total of 26 villages, 793 households (Table 16.1).
The program mostly covered agricultural aspects, such as distribution of nursery plants (rubber and a fruit
trees), distribution of manure and livestock (UGPNP, 2002) (Table 16.2). After decentralization, by the
decree of Ministry of Home Affairs in 2001, the authority over the buffer zone was transferred to the local
government. From the issuance of this decree, the management of the GPNP buffer zone was mainly
implemented by the local development agency (Badan Perencanaan dan Pengendalian Pembangunan Daera; Bapedalpembda). The UGPNP and local government agencies play their role according to the decree of Ketapang District Governor1.
According to the local development agency, there were 109 support programs planned by 2014. Most of the
support programs (104 programs) kept their focus on primary industry aiming to enhance and aid the
agricultural sector become the main source of income for the people living in the buffer zone. However,
there were 3 conditions that disable the local government to play a good management practices:
1
lacked availability of detailed statistical data on the buffer zone.;
lack of number and capacity of staffs who can take care of the vast area of the buffer zone; and
variety of coverage area and characteristics of the buffer zone.
A GPNP officer mentioned that “the range of the buffer zone is wide and regional characteristics varies䟾so
management is difficult2.”
Table 16.1.
Buffer zone support program of Unit Gunung Palung National ParkYear Villages House holds Contents of program
1996/97 5 55 The distribution of the seedling of the fruit tree
1997/98 3 103 The distribution of the seedling of the fruit tree
1998/99 4 170 The distribution of the seedling of the fruit tree, rubber and vegetable
1999/2000 8 260 The distribution of the seedling of the fruit tree and vegetable
Support for farmers groups
2000 2 100 The distribution of the seedling of the fruit tree and vegetable
The distribution of the dung
2001 4 95 The distribution of the seedling of the fruit tree
The distribution of the livestock
Source: UGPNP (2001)
Table 16.2.
Buffer zone support program of local governmentContents of program
Number of programs
According to the annual report of GPNP, damage by illegal logging was 68,500ha, which estimate to 80% of
total area of the national park (UGPNP, 2002) (Figure 16.5). The Ketapang District Governor warned 4
times from 2001 to 2003 to stop logging activities to "the village society that illegally log GPNP3.” In 2001,
almost all area of GPNP - such as Matan Hilir Utara, Sukadana (Figures 16.6& 16.7), Simpang Hilir and
Sengai Laur sub-districts - were seriously damaged by illegal logging (ibid.). In 2004, the area that was
most seriously damaged by illegal logging was Matan area: the northeastern part of the national park (Figure
16.8).
2
Interview to GPNP officer, August 2004䠀
3 Decree of Ketapang District Governor No.680.0200, 2003. (Bupati Ketapang 680/0200/Dhk䟾2003)䟾Decree of Ketapang District
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Figure 16.5.
Damaged area in Gunung Palung National Park (1999-2003) Source: Paper of UTNGP.Figure 16.6.
Logging road in Gunung Palung National Park (August 2003)
Figure 16.8.
Timber basin at Matan Area (August 2003)2.4. Illegal Cultivation
People who live around the park cultivate some parts of GPNP. Most of the areas that have been occupied
local people are in Sukadana and Matan Hilir Utara dub-district. Base on the annual report of Gunung Palung
National Park, the damaged area is 7,200ha (UGPNP, 2003).
2.5. Illegal Mining
Rocks have been collected in Sungai Belit, Munting hamlets and Teluk Datuk Beach, which is inside of the
GPNP. People take rocks for road and house constructions. The area damaged from collecting is around one
hectare and total damaged areas are 3,600ha (UGPNP, 2003).
2.6. Forest Fire
Forest fire are causes by land clearing and opening of land for cultivation. Base on annual report of GPNP,
total damaged area are 10,800ha (UGPNP, 2003).
3. Study Site and Methods
P village that is adjacent to the GPNP in the district Kutapan, West Kalimantan. Double cropping is possible
in this village because a waterway constructed near a rice field has rich water sources that originate from the
mountain (Figure 16.9). The water comes from the mountain irrigated by the paddy field. There were 129
households with 91% of them Melayu. In terms of religion, 96% were Moslem and 4% were Buddhist.
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Figure 16.9.
P village (August 2003)Field survey was conducted for a month in August 2003 for collecting information about the general
conditions for through direct-observation䟾transect and semi-structural interview. Then in 2004, interview
was conducted by using questionnaire. Sample of 40 households (31%) that were engaged in agriculture
from 129 households were randomly sampled from residential list based on tax list and interview for head of
village.
4. Results and Conclusion
The household engaged in the forestry labor were 23 people from 19 households out of 40 households. This
forestry labor was implemented in Matan area. All the people engaged in the forestry labor were men, and
the social status did not matter. 23 people (36%) out of 64 people in the man from 15 years old to 55 years
old engaged in the forestry labor. The period that man began their forestry labor classified into 4 terms:
before decentralization term until 1996 (term 1): the period of Asian economic crisis from 1997 to 1998
(term 2); the shifting period of decentralization from 1999 to 2001 (term 3); and the after the decentralization
after 2002 (term 4). Seven people engaged in forestry labor at term 1, 2 people in term 2, 10 people in term
3, and 4 laboring term 4. It was clear that many people got engaged to forestry labor after the era of
decentralization.
In addition, the study categorized households engaged and those who did not in forestry labor and compared
managed agricultural land area with agricultural conditions for each household. It was identified that those
households who were engaged in forestry labor scored high point on agricultural income, livestock than those
household who were not engaged. From this result䟾it was clear that the households engaged in forestry
labor maintained good condition for agriculture management (Table 16.3).
The household who were engaged in logging activity and those who were not in relation with manpower
were compared. The agriculture management area of the male manpower for around one person was shoe
low score, therefore it was analyzed that those household who were engaged in forestry labor had little time
for agricultural activities (Table 16.4).
Table 16.4.
Comparisons of household condition between logging activity (July 2003-August 2004)Logging
be the key actors for future program design.
Acknowledgments
We wish to thank JICA expert Fujimoto Noboru and his staffs for their encouragement and guidance
throughout this research. And, we are also grateful to staff of Unit Gunung Palung National Park for access
to the national park and for providing information. We thank residence of P village for support our field
survey.
References
Anne C. and Krystof O, 2002. From new order to regional autonomy: Shifting dynamics of “illegal” logging in Kalimantan, Indonesia. World Development (30)12; 2133-2151
BAPEDALPEMBDA Kabupaten Ketapang, 2003. Pemerintah Kabupaten Ketapang rencana penglolaan daerah
penyangga Taman Nasional Gunung Palung. BAPEDALPEMBDA Kabupaten Ketapang, Ketapang.
Soekmadi, R., 2002. National park management in Indonesia: focused on the issues of decentralization and local participation. Cuvillier Verlag, Gottingen.
