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NEW FORESTS, EMPLOYMENT AND MDGS
By Herry Purnomo
The main goals set by developing countries are to improve economic growth, create jobs and alleviate poverty. In 2004, the Indonesian government declared its aim of creating 15.6 million new jobs with the goal of decreasing unemployment from the 2004 level of 9.9% to 5.1% by 2009. It was also anticipated that this would reduce poverty from 16.6% in 2004 to 5.1% in 2009. However, by 2005 unemployment had risen from 2004's figure of 10.3 million to 10.9 million in 2005, and is projected to increase further still to 12.15 million in 2006. In addition, people termed ‘under-employed' or persons working less than 35 hours per week were numbered at more than 30 million in 2005. The economic growth of 6.35% in 2005 was generated by capital intensive industries and did not significantly reduce unemployment.
International Labour Organization estimates reveal that there were one million formal forestry sector workers in Indonesia in 2001. However, the Indonesian Ministry of Forestry (MoF) reported that 150,000 people lost their jobs in forest industries in 2003, and that this figure increased to 600,000 in 2004 due to a shortage of logs. MPI (Society of Indonesian Forestry) reported that 60% of forest employees lost their jobs in 2005 due to the shortage of logs. This loss of jobs corresponds with the destruction of Indonesian natural forest.
While the extent of forest coverage in Asia is increasing due to China's forest plantations, Indonesia forests, which currently number 110 million hectares, continue to degrade at a rate of 2.8 million hectares annually. This paper presents a dynamic model and scenarios of forestry employment in Indonesia and how it relates to MDGs. This model aims to contribute to the development of storylines for alternative futures, for use as a policy development tool.
Forestry employment trends
According to International Standard Industrial Classification (ISIC) Revision 3.3, the forestry sector is comprised of the subsectors: forestry, wood industry and pulp and paper industry. In the forestry subsector most jobs are found in land clearing and illegal logging, followed by industrial forest plantations and legal logging. Woodworking and the pulp and paper industries provide more jobs than plymills and sawmills.
A computer simulation projects a decrease over the next 20 years (2007-2027) in forestry employment in the natural forest concessions of the three main forestry provinces: Riau, East Kalimantan and Papua. However, due to illegal logging, land clearing, industrial forest plantation and pulp and paper industries, total forestry employment is increasing. In these three provinces, employment is estimated to grow from 160,000 to one million in next 15 years. Current projections suggest, however, that the forestry sector will collapse after five years in Riau, 10 years in East Kalimantan, and 15 years in Papua. This means these provinces will experience both booms and busts of forestry employment if current forestry practices continue.
Indonesia annually faces the tragedies of floods, fires and landslides. The government of Indonesia has to deal with about 60 million ha of degraded forest and more than 42 millions of unemployed and underemployed. Can the government keep its promise to decrease employment and alleviate poverty?
Future Scenario of “New Forests New Future”
A simple solution is to give local community members individual or collective rights to plant and manage Indonesia's 60 million hectares of degraded forest. Since planting trees is a long-term investment, the forest management rights must also be long-term, perhaps around 75 years. Each ‘right holder' can decide by his or herself which species to plant. The ‘right holder' can select fastgrowing species like acacia and sengon ( Paraserianthes falcataria ) or long term rotation trees such as teak and mahogany. The government monitors the execution of this right. If the degraded land is not planted, then the government can take back the right with a penalty if necessary. A ‘right holder' is able to sell the rights to the forest she or he planted, not the land, to someone else.
If the government implements this scenario, forests will be restored and will belong to millions of small farmers. This development of new forests will create 12.6 million permanent jobs, which makes up 81% of the government's 2009 employment target. the investment needed is 9 billion USD. This is equal to the amount of money lost over three years to illegal logging. Most of this investment will be done by the local communities themselves. This option will require government confidence in small farmers' ability to plant trees using their own resources. Farmers can find tree seedlings in forested areas. They have traditional knowledge and a culture of planting, maintaining and harvesting trees. They can plant the degraded land piece by piece every week, so that, in few years all the degraded land they manage will be completely planted.
In Indonesia, a small-scale forestry operation needs approximately 3.5 hectares of land to support one job. If it is planted with fast-growing species such as acacia then it will provide a net present value profit of $4.5 per day during eight years. This can be used to ‘Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger' (MDG 1), which is monitored by among others proportion of people living on less than a dollar a day. The MDG 7 to ‘Ensure Environmental Sustainability' means integrating the principles of sustainable development into country policies and programmes; and reversing the loss of environmental resources. Giving long-term rights to local communities ensures reforestation of 60 million hectares of degraded forests in forms of new and diverse small-scale forests.
Forestry can significantly contribute to MDG achievements before 2015 through fast wood small-scale forestry. All the government needs to do is give and secure rights by legalizing local communities' current land claims: not the right to own but the right to manage and benefit from the new forests they plant. The current scheme, to utilize forests through free auctions of large-scale land areas ranging from 20,000 – 100,000 hectares only benefits largescale and multinational companies. The current revision process of Government Regulation ( Peraturan Pemerintah ) No. 34 must clearly prioritize local communities: small-scale actors managing small-scale forest land areas. Such new forests will generate a new future, moving from ‘rich forest poor people' to ‘new forests new future'.
Further information:
Dr. Herry Purnomo
Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), Bogor
Postal address: P.O. Box 6596 JKPWB
Jakarta 10065
Indonesia
Email address: h.purnomo@cgiar.org
AND
Faculty of Forestry, Bogor Agricultural
University, Bogor
Kampus IPB Darmaga, Bogor, Indonesia