As I look around this room, I am glad to see the comprehensiveness of participants. I notice that over the years, from one conference to another—that I have the opportunity to address—the numbers of participants continue to grow. I can see ministers and senior officials responsible for forestry. I also see development specialists, researchers, and academics. And we have among us community representatives, and the private sector. Truly, what brings us together is our passion and enthusiasm to protect our environment.
I am pleased that this enthusiasm is also shared by peoples in Southeast Asia. More countries in the region are adopting sustainable development and green investment practices. Pro-environment policies are increasingly visible in governments’ development strategy and private sector’s plans.
In fact, pro-environment policies are part of Indonesia’s four-prong development strategy that includes pro-growth, pro-jobs, and pro-poor. With this strategy, we are striving to achieve sustainable growth in line with a vision of a green economy.
And one of the new green policies in Indonesia is a nationwide program to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and to enhance our carbon stock. To that end, we are reforming our forest manage-ment to a higher level of sustainability. We are also increasing the number of planted trees and pro-hibiting the clearing of primary forests and lands. As a result, trees are taking root. And forests are gaining more footholds.
In 2011, I signed a moratorium of new utili-zation and conversion licenses to protect more than 63 million hectares of primary forests and peat lands. This is an area larger than the landmass of Malaysia and the Philippines combined. Last year, I extended the policy until 2015. I hope my successor can prolong this moratorium. Through this, we have lowered our deforestation rate from one point two million hectares per year between 2003 and 2006, into 450 and 600 thousand hectares per year during the moratorium period in 2011 until 2013. And therefore, we managed to reduce 211 million tons of CO2 equivalent per year from the business as usual projection.
In the last four years, we have planted more than FOUR BILLION trees. If you have any doubt, I welcome you to start counting them, just don’t loose your counting track, so that you wouldn’t have to start from the beginning again.
A success story in adopting a pro-environment policy can also be seen in the village of Lonca, Central Sulawesi. For generations, Lonca villagers practiced slash-and-burn land clearing. For many decades, this was the only method they know. This practice stopped after the introduction of a community based program to manage forest and watershed area.
The community is now aware of the dangers of slash-and-burn techniques. Besides releasing carbon into the atmosphere, it also destroys habitats and threatens ecosystems. Furthermore, this technique may expose the villagers to greater risk of starvation. And now, Lonca farmers plant on a permanent plot of land. They know how to alternate between crops to ensure land fertility.
Similar stories can also be found throughout Indonesia. After joining a farmers union and obtaining a community forest permit, hundreds of farmers from Gunung Kidul regency, in Yogyakarta, are now managing 115 hectares of land in a sustainable manner. Among giant teak trees, they plant medicinal plants and crops for animal feed. In Konawe Selatan, Southeast Sulawesi, villagers formed a partnership with a global NGO to deliver internationally certified forestry products. And they do this from plots of land they own and manage.
These communities and many other similar community-based organizations are now at the forefront of sustainable forest management efforts. They are planting tree seedlings instead of cutting trees down. They work on a plot of land instead of the unsustainable practices of recent past: slash-and-burn-and-move. Alhamdulillah, these practices have been weeded out from those communities and sustainable land use has now taken root.
Ladies and gentlemen,
