Academics Appreciate the Revocation of Forestry Permits by Gov't

TheIndonesia.id - Forestry expert has praised the Indonesian government for the decision to revoke thousands of permits for forestry, plantation, and mining.

Professor of forest policy at Bogor Agricultural University (IPB) Hariadi Kartodihardjo said the revocation is a positive first step, but the government must now ensure that public is granted access to use and manage the now-available natural resources.

“The revocation must be followed with effort to make certain the [optimum] productivity of forests in forms of both plants and nature itself,” Kartodihardjo said on Thursday, January 6, as reported by Antara. “It could be through a number of policies that will allow local communities to get access to forests, which hasn’t been possible previously due to the permits [held by companies or individuals].”

According to him, prior to the latest decision by the government, communities has been unable to utilize and rehabilitate lands and forests. Therefore, it’s expected that this development will benefit local communities.

Besides the expert, NGO focusing in environmental issues EcoNusa also saw the decision as the right step the government could take towards the protection of forests sustainability and indigenous people’s rights.

“This momentum should be followed with effort to recognize the rights of indigenous peoples and to maximize their potential and role for the sole purpose of economically empowering the community – rather than to allocate the profit for the next permits,” EcoNusa CEO Bustar Maitar said.

On Thursday, President Joko Widodo revoked thousands of mining, forestry, and plantation permits for not following the original designation.

They included 2,078 mining company permits, 192 forestry sector permits covering an area of 3,126,439 hectares, and 34,448 hectares of abandoned plantation land use rights (HGU) that belonged to 36 legal entities.