Events

CHAIRPERSON

Dr Michelle Ann Miller, Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore

ABSTRACT

Riau has the largest area of peatlands in Indonesia and government designated these peatlands as protection or cultivation areas. Most of the peatlands are located in the eastern part of Riau, which is dominated by peatland more than 4 meters depth. The local people started peatlands cultivation in Riau during the colonial era. People developed plantations of coconut, sago palm, and rubber in shallow drained peatland conditions. Trade in sago palm started hundreds of years ago, after this coconut was introduced by Bugis traders and Chinese traders. However, before the 1990s generally peatland deforestation usually occurred in shallow peatlands (peat layer less than 1m depth) for agricultural purposes. Shallow peatland can be converted into productive cropland after shallow drainage. People dig canals into peatlands to lower the water level and then the soils can be planted for rice or other crops. The limitation is peatland productivity decreases with the increasing of peat depth.

Formally, the government started to manage peatlands based on Act No. 5/1967 on Forestry. This law was issued for forest timber exploitation using the Selective Logging Silviculture system. Nevertheless, the amount of forest timber was greatly reduced in the 1990s due to overlogging. Afterward, the government replaced logging concessions with oil palm plantations and industrial forest plantations. As a consequence, Riau’s peatland experienced rapid deforestation and fires became more frequent in this region. The problem of peatland utilization became more complex because the conflict among different interest (conservation and cultivation), land uses, policies, land grabbing, and land encroachment.

To anticipate the negative impact of large-scale plantation development, the government allocated protection areas through Presidential Decree No. 32/1990 on protection areas. This decree declares that peat depth more than 3 meters are set aside as protection areas. However, this policy was not effective with the issuance of concessions on deep peatland by the Ministry of Forestry. Nonetheless, after Riau experience severe fire in 2013 and 2014, the Government start to improve the management of peatlands seriously by issuing Government Regulation No. 71/2014 concerning the Protection and Management of Peat Ecosystems. This regulation determines that 30% of Peatlands Hydrological Unit (KHG) must be protection area and also protects peatland more than 3m deep. Furthermore in 2017, the government has established designations of protection area and cultivation area in peatlands. The planted areas within protection area will be restored to a natural condition after one cycle. The utilization of peatland in the cultivation area is done with a maximum water level 40cm below ground surface. Unfortunately, the Ministry of Environment and Forestry allow the concession to develop plantations in the Protection area outside the peak peat dome based on Regulation Number P.10/2019. The latest policy makes unsustainable peatland management will continue with devastating consequences in global and regional scales.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Prayoto Tonoto is a Senior Staff in the Riau Environmental and Forestry Office in Indonesia. He has worked for Riau Government since 1998. He has a long experience in forest mapping and inventory. His professional background is forest and land governance in Riau related to land use/land cover change and impact assessment. Currently, he works and supervises Peatland Restoration Project in Riau. Prayoto has actively participated in training and discussion relating to participatory mapping, environmental impact analysis, climate change, biodiversity, and REDD+ implementation at home and abroad. He is also as an advisor of land conflicts in concession and state forests.

His research interests include forest management unit, biodiversity, remote sensing, land cover, fire, land tenure, and spatial modeling. He currently leads some NGOs on analyzing the effectiveness and efficiency of Peatland Restoration in Riau. He completed Undergraduate study in Forest Management at Lancang Kuning University, Riau and earned a PhD in Landscape Ecology at Hiroshima University, Japan. His doctoral dissertation in 2018 discussed the Sustainable Peatland Management in Riau. He also earned a Master’s degree in Natural Disaster Management at the Gadjah Mada University, Indonesia.

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