The perspective of actors who have signifcant authority in forest management can be seen from local FMU operations. In Yogyakarta Province, state forest governance is overseen by key actors, which are the Provincial and District Offces. Gunung Kidul District, however, manages community forests within its boundaries and has done so for a long time. The success of the social forestry program through the Community Forest designation (*Hutan Kemasyarakatan* or HKm) is the result of the district government's commitment to fostering and facilitating the establishment and support of forest farmer groups. However, since the enactment of Law 23 of 2014, the confguration of actors has shifted. This is because the forestry sector is now exclusively managed by the central and provincial governments. The implication is that the District Forestry Agency's role has been abolished and all authority is handed over to the province. In an interview with the former head of the District Forestry Agency of Gunung Kidul, we were told:

The impacts of the issuance of Law 23 of 2014 are that the District Forestry Agency of Gunung Kidul – which provided assistance to community forests, forest parks, and farmer groups – were dissolved, and all of its authority was delegated to the Provincial Forestry Agency. The delegation of affairs and authority was only carried out in 2017 where FMU and the District Forestry Agency of Yogyakarta received around 80 structural and functional employees.

Since its establishment in 2011, FMUs have grown to become an important player in state forest management in the Yogyakarta region. Although the regional technical implementation unit (*Unit Pelaksana Teknis Daerah* or UPTD) is under the Provincial Forestry Agency, the existence of FMUs is important because they also function as a substitute for the Agency. FMUs have emerged as a new actor in local forest governance in collaboration with the Provincial Forestry Agency. However, the position and role of the FMUs are again being questioned due to the Omnibus Law. Their responsibility for the territories they manage through forest management is not clear in GR 23 of 2021, nor are they yet to be explained in subsequent implementing regulations. For example, in Article 127, it is stated that forest utilization activities are carried out by Forest Utilization Permits and/or the management of social forestry, not by FMUs. Forest Utilization Permits and Social Forestry Management are the responsibility of the Minister of Environment and Forestry who acts as the licensor. While each Forest Utilization Permit holder is required to prepare a work plan in accordance with the FMU Long-Term Management Plan (*Rencana Pengelolaan Jangka Panjang* or RPJP), we see that the authority of FMUs in their own areas is being questioned due to these other mandates. Meanwhile, many scholars continue to argue that FMUs should be encouraged to develop into independent business units that have creative space in forest utilization activities because they would be managed by individuals with site-specifc expertise (Kartodihardjo et al., 2011; Maryudi, 2016; Pratama et al., 2021). FMUs are no longer authorized to conduct business activities with partners within a forestry

partnership scheme. Social forestry managers can carry out utilization activities independently or in collaboration with other actors, but not with FMUs.

In comparison to FMUs, nongovernment actors that obtain Forest Utilization Permits or social forestry managing entities have a role in forest utilization under current regulations. According to article 40, FMUs should be a unit that ensures the implementation of governance in its jurisdiction. Furthermore, as mentioned in Article 123, all forest management activities must be coordinated with an FMU. As a result, the function of FMU in forest governance must be reviewed, as it has remained unchanged in comparison to prior regulations.

### **9.6 Dimensions of Power**

Risks of perverse incentives have remained in place although seemingly numerous regulatory changes have taken place. For instance, since the issuance of permits was taken back by the authority of the Ministry of Environment and Forestry, the governing authorities at the subnational level markedly diminished. Without licensing powers, provincial forestry agencies that host FMUs may be disinterested in engaging with the additional bureaucratic burden.

FMUs can be viewed as the central government's effort to secure state forests across Indonesia. FMUs must be seen in the context of power as a component of power relations that cannot be separated from the control of the central government, regardless of regional status. According to Sahide et al. (2016), the real struggle of FMUs and community forestry policies indicate a power struggle among the national, provincial, and district bureaucracies. The history of centralized forest governance in Indonesia has impacted the demand for decentralization of forest policy. However, when regions gained autonomy, several strategies were implemented to restrict decentralization of forest resource management, thus maintaining central control.

Currently, the overall authority of FMUs is being questioned and challenged once again, particularly regarding forest governance at the site level. FMUs, which recognize their institutional role as a facilitator, are under the control of the central government through co-administration arrangements. FMUs do not mobilize forest resources because forest use is delegated to nongovernment actors who are granted permits. On the one hand, regulatory tools show that FMUs are hierarchical in nature because they carry out forest management tasks assigned by the central government but are responsible for autonomous forest management at other times. FMUs are directly responsible to the central government. The responsibilities assigned to FMUs are also unclear as there are nongovernmental actors who are able to directly utilize the forest without the assistance of FMUs. Overall, this points to the undermining and marginalization of the role and mandate of the FMU.

We fnd that current government efforts to reintroduce rules-based forest governance are undertaken by providing forest use permit holders with management permit instruments. Meanwhile, market-based governance is implemented through business licenses managed by actors such as individuals, cooperatives, State-Owned Enterprises (*Badan Usaha Milik Negara* or BUMN), Regional-Owned Enterprises (*Badan Usaha Milik Daerah* or BUMD), and Private-Owned Enterprises. The observed model of governance is still dominated by government actors through the formation of a hierarchical bureaucratic system. FMUs thus cannot be discussed separately from central government control. FMUs do not appear to be autonomous organizations with territorial responsibilities and jurisdiction. Collaboration in governance is demonstrated by the presence of nongovernment actors such as community groups and private actors. However, we fnd that horizontal governance by collaborative cooperation has not yet occurred. The actors gain access to permitbased management in accordance with the Minister's standards and guidelines for sustainable forest management.

### **9.7 Conclusion**

Market-based regulations and governance modes have failed to improve forest conditions and have resulted in widespread deforestation in Indonesia. FMUs, established in 2007, aimed at reshaping the governance landscape. In this chapter, FMUs provided an avenue for synthesizing the failures of forest governance over time. Designed to be an autonomous, science-based organization, FMUs have been undermined by their unclear authority and standing.

As of now, the role of FMUs under GR 23 of 2021 is still open to interpretation. Consequently, there are some FMUs that continue to carve out the semblance of their intended functionality. More broadly, however, the framing as a facilitator that emerged from the forestry ministry was undermined through the tight control that the central government redefned for itself. In addition, nongovernment actors, such as social forestry community groups and Forest Utilization Permits, play a growing role in forest management and bypass FMUs because they are only legally responsible to the Minister.

We conclude that forest governance continues to be based on permit-based forest use management, with nongovernmental actors that have expanded to include community as well as private actors. The involvement of nongovernment actors has not demonstrated an open governance model, to which FMUs were envisioned to facilitate. This is because collaboration is still bound by rigid and nonautonomous regulatory dimensions so that a horizontal form of government does not materialize. It also shows how the current governance structure operates, which is hierarchical and governed by top-down mandates and relationships. To achieve the envisioned reforms of establishing FMUs, governance cannot be solely based on rules and markets in the future. Instead, it must be balanced with science-based governance, in which FMUs would play a critical role.

Eventually, the power balance between FMUs and Forestry Agency authority may be rectifed. Doing so would require providing FMUs with suffcient creative space to develop long-term and short-term plans through complementary relationships with the Forestry Agency. Accordingly, FMUs should be encouraged to develop into autonomous institutions that also serve local interests.

### **References**

**Ramli Ramadhan** is a lecturer in the forestry study program at the University of Muhammadiyah Malang's Faculty of Agriculture and Animal Husbandry. He received a master's degree from Gadjah Mada University. He has worked as a researcher at the Sajogyo Institute, working on social forestry concerns. He is interested in pursuing research on forest politics, social forestry, and forest governance at the moment.

**Soetrisno Karim** has a career for 33 years and currently is a director general of Forestry Planning at the Indonesian Ministry of Forestry. He has developed an FMU policy in Indonesia. He is continuing his profession as a senior policy advisor in several private companies. In addition, he is also involved as a deputy chairperson of the Forestry Engineering College, the Institution of Engineers, Indonesia.

**Micah R. Fisher** is a fellow in the Research Program at the East-West Center. He conducts research on the human dimensions of environmental change in the Asia-Pacifc. He is affliate graduate faculty at the Department of Urban and Regional Planning at the University of Hawai at Mānoa and lectures in the Department of Forestry at Hasanuddin University. He currently serves as co-editor in chief for the journal *Forest and Society*.

**Harsanto Mursyid** is a lecturer in the Department of Forestry, Faculty of Agriculture, Riau University, and a researcher at Sebijak Institut. He received master degrees in forestry at Universitas Gadjah Mada and Kyoto University (2019). He has several research studies focusing on social aspects in forestry. This year, Mursyid is studying social forestry in Riau province focusing on how social forestry contributes to food security and climate change.

**Mochamad Indrawan** is affliated with Universitas Indonesia's Center for Biodiversity and Conservation (CBC-I-SER-FMIPA UI). He is a trained ecologist with longer-term experiences, including continuous facilitation of indigenous peoples and local communities whose joint endeavor is focused on the establishment of community conservation areas (CCAs) in Central Sulawesi. He is also a member of two IUCN specialist groups (World Commission on Protected Areas and Red List Authority).

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### **Chapter 10 Biofuels Development and Indirect Deforestation**

### **Rizky Ramadhan, Akihisa Mori, and Oekan S. Abdoellah**

**Abstract** The Indonesian government launched the B30 program (a mixture of 30% biodiesel and 70% diesel fuel) in 2019 to save foreign exchange, reduce dependence on fossil fuels, and improve environmental quality. Indonesia uses palm oil as the main source for making biodiesel, as proven by an increase in the domestic market demand for biodiesel by as much as 2.69 million tons. This is followed by the increase of the area of palm oil plantations by 4.25 million hectares from 2014 to 2020. In contrast, the rate of deforestation in the three main palm oil-producing islands (Sumatra, Kalimantan, and Papua) tends to decline. These facts raise a hypothesis that the B30 program may trigger indirect deforestation or conversion of nonforest areas to palm oil. To prove this hypothesis, we use the geographic information system (GIS) to detect and analyze land cover by looking at historical data on land-use changes in the Province of Riau and Central Kalimantan, the largest palm oil-producing provinces. The development of biofuels under the moratorium regulation indirectly encourages oil palm companies to open oil palm plantations in areas originally used as cultivation areas. The loss of land for cultivation has encouraged local communities to clear land for cultivation in the forest. This situation is what we call indirect deforestation.

**Keywords** KCP · Governance · Representation · Palm oil · ISPO · Indonesia

### **10.1 Introduction**

Indonesia's government committed to reducing GHG emissions by 29% from Business as Usual (BAU) by 2030. For this purpose, starting in 2020, the Government of Indonesia issued a mandatory program of biodiesel called B30 (a mixture of 30%

O. S. Abdoellah

R. Ramadhan (\*) · A. Mori

Graduate School of Global Environmental Studies, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
Department of Anthropology-Faculty of Social and Political Sciences and Center for Environment and Sustainability Science, Universitas Padjadjaran, Bandung, Indonesia

<sup>©</sup> The Author(s) 2023

A. Triyanti et al. (eds.), *Environmental Governance in Indonesia*, Environment & Policy 61, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-15904-6\_10

biodiesel and 70% diesel fuel), making Indonesia the highest implementer of biodiesel in the world. This program claimed to beneft the state by adding foreign exchange of \$ 3.4 billion.

As palm oil is a raw material for biodiesel, this program can contribute positively to the regional economy by alleviating rural poverty and promoting local infrastructure development (Janda et al., 2012; Pacheco et al., 2017). On the other hand, the development of oil palm plantations is often associated with deforestation and causes the loss of biodiversity and exacerbates climate change that has already occurred (Cazzolla Gatti & Velichevskaya, 2020; Miettinen et al., 2014; Oon et al., 2019; Vijay et al., 2016).

An increasing number of domestic markets demand for biodiesel by as much as 2.69 million tons, followed by the increase in the area of palm oil plantations by 4.25 million hectares from 2014 to 2020. In contrast, the rate of deforestation in the three main palm oil-producing islands (Sumatra, Kalimantan, and Papua) tends to decline. The government, through the Ministry of Environment and Forestry, prohibits the clearing of oil palm in conservation of forest areas but allows the clearing of oil palm land in other use land (APL) or nonforest areas through Law No. 41 of 1999. This indicates that the government is trying to reduce deforestation in Indonesia. However, the conversion of other land uses to palm oil will cause deforestation through the process of indirect deforestation.

Several studies show that indirect deforestation occurs in the development of soybean commodities (Gollnow et al., 2018; Lima et al., 2011; Song et al., 2021). Studies on indirect deforestation in oil palm development are still limited. However, a study by Ramadhan et al. (2021) shows that on a small scale, indirect deforestation has occurred in the Dusun Tonggong, Parindu, West Kalimantan, Indonesia, due to the development of oil palm commodities in the area. The previous research regarding indirect deforestation in the context of oil palm development has a limited scope of the study, so this chapter tries to see if something similar is happening in the level of provinces in Indonesia, particularly the provinces of Riau and Central Kalimantan. We use a Geographic Information System (GIS) to detect and analyze indirect deforestation by looking at historical data on land-use changes.

### **10.2 Biofuel Policy**

### *10.2.1 Mandatory Blending Rates of Biodiesel in Indonesia*

In 2006, through Presidential Decree No. 5/2006, the Indonesian government made the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources the legal body to create the National Energy Management Blueprint. One of the targets is to increase biofuel utilization (higher than 5%). In this year, biodiesel was also used for the frst time through the Directorate General of Oil and Gas Decree No. 3675 K/24/DJM/2006 with a maximum limit of 10% FAME (Fatty, Acid, Methyl, and Ester) content.

Although in 2006 biofuels were used, the government, for the frst time, issued a mandatory to use biodiesel in 2008, through the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources Decree No. 32/2008. At this time, the government only allowed the use of B2.5–B.7.5 (a mixture of 2.5% to 7.5% biodiesel to diesel fuel). In 2010, the government established the Directorate General of Renewable Energy and Energy Conservation. One of its directorates is the Directorate of Bioenergy, which handles biodiesel. This Directorate plays an essential role in developing biofuels policy, including the improvement of regulations related to mandatory and biodiesel specifcations. This B2.5–B7.5 program lasted until 2013.

The B2.5–B7.5 program in 2014 was followed by B10, which was later increased to B15 in 2015. In 2015, the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources Decree No. 12/2015 replaced the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources Decree No. 32/2008. This regulation has currently become the reference for implementing mandatory biodiesel in Indonesia.

The B20 mandate, implemented in 2016, is a new history, especially for Indonesia, where Indonesia is the frst country to implement B20. Even though it is considered successful in the transportation sector, this mandatory B20 program has not been followed by other sectors. Some of the obstacles faced are price, availability, and distribution, which are still limited. To expand the use of B20 in all sectors, the government issued Presidential Decree No. 66/2018 and implemented it in September 2018. This Presidential Decree succeeded in reducing diesel imports in September by 379,400 tons (see Fig. 10.2). Despite the increase in the following months after the implementation of Presidential Decree No. 66/2018, overall, this program succeeded in reducing diesel imports by 466,902 KL (Public Relation Directorate General of New and Renewable Energies and Energy Conservation, 2019) (see Fig. 10.1).

**Fig. 10.1** Progressive blending rates in biodiesel policy and implementation in Indonesia. (Source: Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources, 2021)

**Fig. 10.2** Imported Indonesian diesel after the presidential decree (66/2018). (Source: "*Impor Solar Oktober*," 2018)

The government of Indonesia implemented the mandatory program B30 on January 1, 2020. Until now, this program has been running for more than one and a half years. This program is considered successful. The B30 program up to semester one has saved Indonesia's foreign exchange of 1.7 billion USD.

### *10.2.2 Environmental Impacts on Biofuels Program*

The biofuels program in Indonesia is considered to be acceptable by the public because since 2016 the government has guaranteed through incentives that the price of biofuel is not higher than the price of fuel. This has been proven to increase biofuel sales (Wiratmini, 2019). Data in 2019 shows that domestic demand for biofuels in Indonesia has increased by 2.22 million tons (see Table 10.1). The development of this demand is in line with the increase in palm oil plantation area. Based on the Directorate General of Estate data, there was an increase in the area of palm oil plantations by 0.39 million hectares in 2019 (see Fig. 10.3).

Indonesia uses palm oil as the primary source of biodiesel production. Several parties in Indonesia debate it (Corley, 2009; Kamahara et al., 2010; Khatiwada et al., 2021; Oosterveer, 2020). The development of palm oil plantations is often associated with deforestation and causes the loss of biodiversity and exacerbates climate change that has already occurred.

In principle, the government of Indonesia and all palm oil stakeholders are against any illegal practices of palm oil stakeholders. For this reason, the government implemented a moratorium and Indonesian Sustainable Palm Oil (ISPO) certifcate as a policy (Salman and Mori in this volume). Although the effectiveness of the palm oil development moratorium is still in question and becoming a debatable

**Table 10.1** Biodiesel production and usages in Indonesia (recreated by the author based on data from Indonesia Biofuel Producers 2020

Source: Indonesian Biofuel Producers 2020, cited from Council of Palm Oil Producing Countries (2021)

**Fig. 10.3** Total area of palm oil plantation (recreated by the author based on data from Directorate General of Estate Crops). (Source: Directorate General of Estate Crops, 2019)

issue, this regulation affects the rate of deforestation in Indonesia (see Fig. 10.4). From this fgure, the rate of deforestation declined, and the government claimed that the decline of the deforestation rate is due to the success of the implementation of the moratorium program (Austin et al., 2019). However, the other argument claims that the decline of the deforestation rate during the last 2 years is due to the La Nina years, wet conditions resulting in a less fammable landscape (Gaveau et al., 2022).

In addition, many mentioned that the potential massive deforestation is still there (Andrianto et al., 2019; Gaveau, 2018; The Gecko Project, 2018). This is particularly true in the Papua and West Papua provinces, where a million forestlands have been allocated or licensed to oil palm companies for the development of oil palm plantations in the future (Gaveau, 2018). Based on the data in Fig. 10.5, the deforestation rate in Papua provinces tends to increase, despite the existence of the moratorium (see Fig. 10.5).

### *10.2.3 Indirect Deforestation*

Indirect deforestation occurs when one commodity in one location displaces the previous commodity to the frontier forest area (Rausch & Gibbs, 2016). Oil palm plantations can claim that their plantations are deforestation-free because they are

**Fig. 10.4** Total deforestation in Indonesia. (Source: BPS, 2019)

**Fig. 10.5** Deforestation in Papua. (Source: NASA Earth Observatory, 2021)

built on nonforest lands such as vacant felds or land. Palm oil plantations may use land that the local people should use to cultivate their daily needs. It is not uncommon for the cultivation of biofuels to replace previous agricultural activities.

**Fig. 10.6** Biofuel program and indirect deforestation

In this case, small-scale farmers who lack access to land and working capital are likely to relocate their cultivation areas to forest areas (Castiblanco et al., 2015; Jensen et al., 2019; Mukherjee & Sovacool, 2014; Saikkonen et al., 2014; Saswattecha et al., 2016; Silalertruksa & Gheewala, 2012). Indirect deforestation caused by displacement or loss of community farming land is diffcult to prevent because people need new areas to maintain their livelihoods (Azhar et al., 2021).

Biofuel programs based on vegetable oil raised environmental impacts and indirect deforestation issues (see Fig. 10.6). When the demand for palm oil for biofuels is increasing, it is likely to be followed by an increase in the area of oil palm plantations.

### **10.3 GIS Analysis of Indirect Deforestation**

### *10.3.1 Methodology*

An understanding of indirect deforestation in the development of biofuels in Indonesia is needed to prevent unintended consequences from deforestation prevention policies. This information can help policymakers be more careful and provide a broader picture of deforestation prevention programs. The challenge of this issue is the diffculty in detecting or measuring indirect deforestation (Breetz, 2017; Jafari et al., 2017; Mukherjee & Sovacool, 2014). To overcome this, we use the geographic information system (GIS) to detect and analyze land cover by looking at historical data on land-use changes in Riau and Central Kalimantan as the largest palm oil producers. We examined 890,654 points for Central Kalimantan and 1,038,607 points for the Province of Riau, which was selected based on the image's clarity through satellite imagery.

**Table 10.2** Area and palm oil production

Source: Statistical of National Leading Estate Crops Commodity, 2019–2021

### *10.3.2 Case Selection*

Riau and Central Kalimantan provinces have great potential in developing biodiesel production. The largest area of palm oil plantation is in Riau Province, 2.7 million hectares in 2019, with a CPO production of 9.5 million tons. Central Kalimantan ranks third for the land area with 1.9 million hectares, but CPO production is the second largest after Riau Province, with 7.6 million tons (see Table 10.2). With this land area and total production, Riau and Central Kalimantan provinces have become the largest biodiesel suppliers in Indonesia.

The development of oil palm plantations as biodiesel raw material in the Riau and Central Kalimantan Province and the palm oil moratorium can make local people lose land for farming. People who lose their land tend to clear forests to establish farmland (Azhar et al., 2021). This tendency helps us identify indirect deforestation in Riau and Central Kalimantan Provinces.

### **10.4 Results**

### *10.4.1 Indirect Deforestation in Riau (Fig. 10.7)*

Based on calculations from GIS, the total change in forest area converted directly to oil palm from 1990 to 2020 is 1,502,192 ha, while the total area of forest opened by indirect deforestation activities is 277,126 ha (see Table 10.3). The data shows that 84% of forest cover loss in Riau from 1990 to 2020 was caused by direct deforestation activities from oil palm plantations, and only 16% caused by indirect deforestation (see Fig. 10.8).

### *10.4.2 Indirect Deforestation in Central Kalimantan (Fig. 10.9)*

Based on the GIS calculation, the total area of forest open as a direct result of oil palm plantations in the Central Kalimantan region is 459.524 ha. In comparison, that caused by indirect deforestation is 384.596 ha (see Table 10.4). Also, 54% of

**Fig. 10.7** Land use change in Riau (1990–2000). The picture shows that palm oil has existed in the Riau area since 1990. It has grown rapidly from 2010 to 2020. (Source: Data Processing from USGS satellite imagery)

**Table 10.3** Total area by land-use change activity in Riau Province

Source: Data Processing

land cover loss in Central Kalimantan is due to direct land conversion from forest to oil palm plantations, and 46% of forest cover loss in Central Kalimantan is caused by indirect deforestation (see Fig. 10.10).

**Fig. 10.8** Percentage of land-use change activity in Riau Province. (Source: Data Processing)

**Fig. 10.9** Land-use change in Central Kalimantan (1990–2000). Same as in the Riau province, in Central Kalimantan, oil palm plantations have appeared since 1990, but their development has been very rapid from 2010 to 2020. (Source: Data Processing from USGS satellite imagery)

**Table 10.4** Total area by land-use change activity in Central Kalimantan Province

Source: Data Processing

**Fig. 10.10** Percentage of land-use change activity in Central Kalimantan Province. (Source: Data Processing)

### **10.5 Discussion**

### *10.5.1 Palm Oil Moratorium and Indirect Deforestation in Riau and Central Kalimantan*

The results of the GIS analysis show that indirect deforestation occurs in large forested provinces such as both Riau and Central Kalimantan provinces. In particular, for the Central Kalimantan Province, almost half the forest is open due to indirect deforestation. The palm oil moratorium is one of the triggers for indirect deforestation.

The palm oil moratorium is through Presidential Decree No. 8/2018 concerning postponement and evaluation of palm oil plantation permits and increasing productivity of palm oil plantation. This government regulation minimizes the opening of palm oil plantations in forest areas. Responding to the regulation, the company opened its palm oil plantations in nonforest areas. In most cases, the community generally uses the land for farming. Palm oil plantation development in nonforest areas causes local communities to lose land for agriculture. The development of palm oil plantations in several areas triggers domestic migration and encourages local communities to give up their lands to immigrants (Pacheco et al., 2017).

Loss of land for agriculture due to palm oil plantation development in local community areas forced local people to open forest areas for cultivation. Palm oil expansion in nonforest areas triggers deforestation by local people in other areas (Feintrenie et al., 2010; Nelson et al., 2014; Ramadhan et al., 2021).

### *10.5.2 Indirect Deforestation and the Small-Scale Farmers*

Small-scale farmers are also the driving factors for deforestation in Indonesia. Twenty-two percent of deforestation comes from activities carried out by smallscale farmers (Austin et al., 2019), which is almost the same as research conducted by Agus et al. (2013) and Gaveau et al. (2016). Small-scale farmers commonly employ slash-and-burn practices with shifting cultivation systems. They burn land to fertilize the soil and then use the land to cultivate the desired crop (Comte et al., 2012; van Vliet et al., 2013). This activity can usually only support a few years of production, after which the community will leave the land and move to another area. The increasing population and limited land due to competition with oil palm commodities have made the fallow time signifcantly shortened (Ramadhan et al., 2019). The shorter rotation pattern makes the soil lack nutrients. It affects the amount of production from the plants they grow, driving farmers to clear out further sections of forest (Azhar et al., 2021). Furthermore, to prevent the impact of slash-burn cultivation, the zero-burn technic can be used as an alternative. However, the use of zero-burning will decrease the proftability and increase the cost of local farmers (Sofyuddin et al., 2021).

The development of oil palm in nonforest areas exerts indirect pressure on the forest areas elsewhere (Ramadhan et al., 2021). Community needs for sources of income and limited land due to competition with oil palm plantations for biofuels increase the possibility of indirect deforestation.

### *10.5.3 Integrated and Sustainable Environmental Governance for Forestry and Agriculture*

An alternative would be developing the concept of communal palm oil plantations for the community. This method is considered essential to improve the community's welfare, especially for those who live in limitations such as rural areas (Baharuddin, 2012; Kumar et al., 2015). In order to prevent the "tragedy of the commons," as mentioned by Hardin (1968), an agreement regarding the rules for using resources is needed (Marten, 2001; see also Ostrom, 1990). Communal ownership is not a new thing, especially in Indonesia. One example as mentioned by Mulyoutami et al. (2009), is the "*simpukng*" of the Dayak community in East Kalimantan. *Simpukng* is a secondary forest that is managed by the community, where its utilization is regulated by customary rules to avoid over-exploitation. The development of communal oil palm plantations gives communities access to equal production areas and prevents them from clearing forests in the future.

The development of biofuels using vegetable oil or what we often call frstgeneration biofuels, although economically it is cost-effective, has a relatively large environmental impact from an environmental point of view. The development of second (production of biofuel using waste) and third (development of biofuel using microalgae) generation can be an alternative to be developed so as to reduce the impact on the environment, although economically it is more expensive because it requires advanced technology (Naik et al., 2010; Sadatshojaei et al., 2020; Saladini et al., 2016).

### **10.6 Concluding Remarks**

The development of biofuels under the moratorium regulation indirectly encourages oil palm companies to open oil palm plantations in areas originally used as cultivation areas. The development of oil palm in nonforest areas puts pressure on forest areas elsewhere. This is because people still need land to grow the crops they need for their daily needs.

The loss of land for cultivation due to the development of oil palm plantations for biofuels has encouraged local communities to clear land for cultivation in forest areas. The community does this to maintain their livelihoods. Indirect deforestation that occurs due to the loss of community-owned cultivation land is diffcult to prevent.

Integrated and sustainable governance is needed, with an understanding of indirect deforestation, local plantation practices, and their role in the surrounding community. The development of secondary and third-generation biofuels can be an alternative to reduce the environmental impact caused by biofuels based on oil palm plantations. Another option is to develop communal palm oil plantations for the community. With communal ownership, it is expected that the benefts obtained could be distributed more evenly, providing security to the poor by converting individual risk into collective risk, increasing management capabilities, and facilitating each individual involved in business development (Ishak et al., 2020; Ortmann & King, 2007). In that condition, the community has a livelihood and prevents the clearing of land in forest areas.

We explored why the ISPO is underperforming and how the governance of ISPO has been improved. A case study is a relevant method for exploring "how" question and when the observation has no control over behavioral events (Yin, 2017). We used the establishment of the ISPO as a case study and treated the implementation of ISPO regulation as a policy action resulting from KCP for governance (Table 10.1). We analyzed the Bappenas policy paper used for ISPO regulation as a form of coproduced knowledge using principles of successful sustainability research (Norström et al., 2020).

### **References**

**Rizky Ramadhan** is a Ph.D. student at the Graduate School of Global Environmental Studies, Kyoto University, Japan. His current research and papers focus on palm oil plantations and their impact on the environment, local communities, and indirect deforestation. He currently works as a research assistant at the University of Indonesia, working on a project on forest and land fres in the Kalimantan region.

**Akihisa Mori** is an associate professor at the Graduate School of Global Environmental Studies, Kyoto University, Japan, and an ex-vice president of the Asian Association of Environmental and Resource Economics. His current research focus is sustainability transitions and multidimensional impacts of China's Belt and Road Initiative. He is the author of numerous papers in journals and book chapters and has written or edited 15 books, including China's Carbon-Energy Policy and Asia's Energy Transitions (Routledge, Abingdon, 2022).

**Oekan S. Abdoellah** is a professor at the Department of Anthropology—Faculty of Social and Political Sciences and Center for Environment and Sustainability Science, Universitas Padjadjaran, Indonesia. He was a visiting professor at several universities such as the University of Tokyo, Japan; the University of Freiburg, Germany; and a research fellow at Kyoto University. He is currently a visiting professor at the University of Fukuoka, Japan. He was a member of the Indonesian delegation for the third meeting of the preparatory committee for the World Summit on Sustainable Development, United Nations Headquarters, New York, and the fourth meeting in Bali. From 1979 to the present, he has published many articles and books. He is an external reviewer of several international journals.

**Open Access** This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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### **Chapter 11 The Dynamics of the Green Policies in Papua Land: A Political Economy Study**

**Yulia Indrawati Sari**

**Abstract** The provincial governments of Papua and West Papua have expressed their commitments and enacted policies to develop Papua Land in a sustainable manner through the issuance of Papua 2100 Vision, the 2019 Manokwari Declaration, and the 'green' spatial plan of Papua province. However, the implementation of these policies in balancing protection of forests and improvement of livelihood of indigenous Papuans has been slow. By employing a political economy approach, the study explores how interactions between the political economy structure, institutions, and actors have resulted in slow implementation of such commitments, particularly in reviewing the compliance of land-based industry licenses and acknowledging customary (adat) areas. The study was conducted between February 2020 and March 2021 and encompassed approximately 50 key informant interviews – including donors, civil society organizations, adat leaders, national and subnational governments, observers, academics, and journalists – and document review. The fndings of this study suggest that the reform is mainly driven by development partners and limited numbers of bureaucrats that align with the indigenous Papuans' interest to protect their land from outsiders. The small coalitions were successful in focusing their effort to enact green policies in the two provinces. However, the study highlights constraints faced by these actors to turn the policies into actions: (1) the existence of wide array of powerful actors – non-Papuans and Papuans – with strong economic and political interests identifed at central, provincial, and regency level to hinder the enforcement of problematic land-based licenses and clarify adat areas; (2) the absence of broad-based political support. These have hampered the implementation of the green policies under the two aspects above. This study recommends reviewing policy at the national level to create enabling environment for green policies implementation in both provinces, e.g., to review the Omnibus Law, supporting the regency-level actors to accelerate issuance of the perda PPMHA and local-level regulations on adat-managed areas, supporting licenses review in Southern part of Papua Province to limit the operation of these

Y. I. Sari (\*)

© The Author(s) 2023

International Relations Department, Parahyangan Catholic University, Bandung, Indonesia e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
A. Triyanti et al. (eds.), *Environmental Governance in Indonesia*, Environment & Policy 61, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-15904-6\_11

businesses to expand in forest areas and disrespect adat rights over their lands, and exploring engagement with the opposing parties at all administrative level.

**Keywords** *Adat* · Green policies · Papua · Reform

### **11.1 Introduction**

The Papua and West Papua provincial governments have shown commitments to green development. In 2010, the provincial government of Papua declared the 'Papua Province 2100 Vision' to protect 90% of its land as forest areas and 60% as protected areas. In 2013, this green vision was clearly refected in its Spatial Plan for 2013–2033 (*Rencana Tata Ruang Wilayah Provinsi* or RTRWP).1 The provincial government of its neighbour, West Papua, declared the province a 'Conservation Province' in 2015. This green target was then further affrmed in the Manokwari Declaration three years later, consisting of various commitments including to protect 70% of the land areas of both provinces.

This green vision offers a great opportunity to develop these easternmost provinces in Indonesia2 in a sustainable manner to prevent negative impacts to the environment and natural resources, as well as to the livelihood of indigenous Papuan people (*orang asli Papua* or OAP). This is particularly important since Papuan primary forest held 41% of Indonesia's remaining primary forest in 2020, covering an area of 19 million hectares (KLHK, 2021). This vision is also of great signifcance for many OAP who, historically, have faced marginalization and exclusion (Widjojo et al., 2008) and live under poor development conditions (Resosudarmo et al., 2009) to have access and control over natural resources to improve their livelihood while ensuring forest sustainability. Based on Indonesian Statistical Yearbook (2020), 21.7% and 26.8% of West Papua and Papua Provinces population, respectively, are still living below the national poverty line, much higher compared to the national average of 10.19% (BPS, 2020). Papua is also the province with the lowest and widest inter-district3 disparity in the human development index.

By employing a political economy approach, this article aims to explore the gap between green policy formulation and the policy implementation. The main question to be addressed in this research is 'how do interactions among actors, institutions and structures promote or hinder green development policy formulation and its implementation?' This article begins with a description of the method of the study. This is followed by an explanation of the green policy formulation processes

<sup>1</sup>See local regulation (*peraturan daerah*, *perda*) of Papua No. 23/2013 on Papua Provincial Spatial Plan for 2013–2033.

<sup>2</sup>The term 'Papua Land' refers to the two provinces. We use 'Papua Province and West Papua Province' to refer to the specifc provinces.

<sup>3</sup> In this article, we use 'district' to represent regency (*kabupaten*) and municipality (*kota*), not subdistrict (kecamatan or 'distrik' in Papua and West Papua context).

and milestones, an analysis of the challenges in the implementation, and ends with conclusions and recommendations.

### **11.2 Study Methods**

This study employs a political economy approach that provides exploration on the dynamic interaction between actors, institutions, and structures to understand how decisions are made and how development outcome is produced (Unsworth & Williams, 2011; DFID, 2009). This approach assumes that policy success or failure is shaped by actors' strategy, contestation, and negotiation among various interest groups, particularly from those who gain or lose beneft from the policy (Leftwich, 2007). Different groups in society, especially political elites, have different interests and incentives to promote or to hinder policy implementation. Political economy analysis also looks at the relationship between the roles and power of actors in a broader context: that actors' incentives and strategy are closely related to the role of institutions and structures (DFID, 2009; Leftwich, 2007).

By employing the political economy approach, this study entails understanding on three inter-related concepts (Serrat, 2011; DFID, 2009). First, the role and strategy of actors – individuals, organizations, or coalitions – with both formal and informal infuence in promoting or hindering environmental policy and its implementation (Harris, 2013). Second, the role of formal and informal institutions that limits or promotes actors' role and strategy to formulate and implement environmental policy, which tend to be more susceptible to change in the medium term than structural features (see North, 1990). Third, the role of political economy structure in driving actors' role and strategy in promoting and hindering green development. The term 'structure' refers to well-established economic, social, cultural, and ideological systems that infuence actors' strategy and is relatively more diffcult to change than institutional factors (DFID, 2009; Leftwich, 2007). This study also assesses the policy implementation of green development policies, particularly in the areas of review of land-based industries in mining, forest and plantation concessions and acknowledgement of *adat* areas.

In regard to the data collection method, this study employs interviews as the main data gathering method. Fifty informants who were involved in the formulation and implementation of the green policies were interviewed, consisting of donors, civil society organizations, *adat* leaders, national and subnational governments, observers, academics, and journalists. The interviews were conducted in two phases: face-to-face interviews in Jakarta, Jayapura, and Manokwari in February 2020, followed by interviews between May and August 2020, conducted online due to the COVID-19 pandemic.4 The researchers also participated in ten webinars on the

<sup>4</sup>Due to the sensitive nature of the research, identity of all informants will be kept confdential in this report.

topics of green policy implementation in the Papua Land. Due to time constraints and pandemic situation, the study focused on interviewing key informants who involved in the policy formulation and implementation and did not interview communities and hence, the fndings of this study must be seen in the light of these limitations. This study also reviewed government documents and statistical data, articles, media coverage and investigative reports from credible organizations to complement the primary data.

### **11.3 Green Policies Formulation Milestone**

The study identifes green policies in both provinces were initiated by international development partners and a limited number of provincial-level bureaucrats that meet with the interest of OAP to protect their rich resources from outsiders. In Papua Province, the ideas were frst introduced by the Department for International Development (DFID) of the Government of the United Kingdom through its Multistakeholder Forestry Program (MFP) in 2000–2008, followed by a capacity-building program and technical assistance supported by the UK Foreign Commonwealth Offce (FCO) in 2009–2011. The UK consultants formed a solid team with experienced facilitators from Indonesia and collaborated with then Head of the Provincial Development Planning Agency (Bappeda), Alex Rumaseb, under the support from (then) Governor Barnabas Suebu. One of the milestones was capacity-building activities that were systematically developed to train civil servants, targeted at Bappeda offcers, starting in 2009. The participants were limited to only 15 people, known as '*Tim 15*', consisting of 12 Bappeda staff and three offcers from other provincial offces. In addition to the FCO program, a United States Agency for International Development (USAID)-funded program also supported Bappeda in drafting the spatial plan, which refects sustainable land use management. By employing the 'system thinking' method with a strong process-oriented approach, not less than 32 workshops were held intensively in isolated places which effectively shaped *Tim 15*'s awareness on the policy's effects on OAP lives and on the environment. The process resulted in the production of the Papua Province 2100 vision to maintain 90% of its land as forest areas with OAPs as change agents in 100 years as well as the 'green' 2013–2033 Spatial Plan in December 2013 (DFID, 2019).5

Similarly, the green policy formulation process in West Papua Province was marked by two declarations, namely the Conservation Province Declaration on 19 October 2015 and the Manokwari Declaration at the International Conference on Biodiversity, Ecotourism and Creative Economy Papua (ICBE) on 10 October 2018.

<sup>5</sup>The information in this paragraph is based on interviews with the following key informants: a DFID consultant involved in the project on 19 May 2020; aid agency on 6 February 2020; former head of Bappeda on 17 February 2020; '*Tim 15*' members on 18 February 2020 and on 9 June 2020; and facilitators on 19 May 2020.

The idea of the Conservation Province was frst discussed in mid-2013 in a small circle among then West Papua governor (Abraham Atururi), West Papua Provincial Secretary (Nathaniel Mandacan), and academics from Papuan University (UNIPA) – Agus Sumule and Charlie Heatubun – facilitated by Ketut Sarjana Putra from Conservation International (CI). The governor declared West Papua a Conservation Province in 2015. In 2017, the United Kingdom Climate Change Unit (UKCCU) continued to stimulate green policies in West Papua with other development partners through its Papua Initiative program. They closely worked with the Head of the Provincial Research and Development Board (Balitbangda), Charlie Heatubun, under the support of Governor Dominggus Mandacan and the Provincial Secretary, Nathaniel Mandacan. The coalition also involved a wider group of international development organizations and local civil society organizations (CSOs). On 10 October 2018, Governor Mandacan signed the Manokwari Declaration at ICBE, which was considered a sign of his commitment to green development policies. The Manokwari Declaration contained 14 points to achieve the shared vision of Tanah Papua as a 'Land of Peace, Sustainability, and Dignity' (Cámara-Leret et al., 2019). The provincial government of West Papua issued a special regional regulation (*peraturan daerah khusus or perdasus*) on Sustainable Development in West Papua Province (No. 10/2019) dated 29 November 2019. In a consultation process prior to the issuance of the *perdasus*, the Ministry of Home Affairs requested to change the title from 'Conservation' to 'Sustainable Development' as conservation is considered the national government's authority.6

The Central Government seems to have different priorities in developing Papua Land. It has promoted investment in Papua to accelerate economic growth in Papua and West Papua provinces. This was manifested in the form of a central government request to allocate land for investment in Papua, despite the Papua 2100 vision. In mid-2013, *Tim 15* rejected the central government's request to allocate 2.5 million hectares of land for the Merauke Integrated Food and Energy Estate project (MIFEE). *Tim 15* was safeguarding 228 hundred hectares allocated for MIFEE in the draft RTRWP that was deliberated by the provincial DPRD and eventually issued.7 They protected about 2.3 million hectares of forests through the issuance of the RTRWP.8

In the Papuan context, the sustainable development and conservation narrative provides opportunities for key players in the provincial governments to gain recognition from international actors and access to climate fnance while at the same time also trying to adhere to the special autonomy narrative, 'Protecting rich natural resources for the beneft of OAP'. The top provincial leaderships support green

<sup>6</sup>This paragraph is based on interviews with key informants from CI on 11 February 2020; CSO on 23 January and 20 February 2020; and aid agency on 23 January 2020.

<sup>7</sup>Based on interview with Tim 15 member who represented the provincial government on 9 and 12 June 2013.

<sup>8</sup>There is limited data available on the amount of forest confscated by MIFEE, but Yayasan PUSAKA's investigation (2011) indicates that most of the land for MIFEE licenses is located in forest areas.

policies to make Papua Land nationally and globally recognized, while gaining popularity among elite Papuans, thus providing advantages to expand broad-based political support. Opportunities to access funding for the environmental agenda have also provided incentives for top leaderships and academia to strongly support this policy. Following the Paris Agreement in 2015, climate fnance has been available in the form of international public and private funding to incentivize and compensate reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. In 2017, total climate-related fnancing was \$510 billion to \$530 billion globally, indicating a steady increase in fund from 472 billion in 2015 and USD 455 billion in 2016 (CPI, 2018). Furthermore, as the last reserve of tropical forest with high biodiversity, many international organizations have environment protection agenda in Papua and West Papua provinces, including in accessing climate fnancing.

The idea of sustainable development in Papua province is particularly in line with the narrative and discourse on marginalization of OAP. Many OAPs, including those holding position in provincial governments, have perceived that the OAP has limited control over their own land and hence, the green policy idea introduced by international organization was highly supported. Members of *Tim 15* have experienced discrimination themselves and have listened to marginalization stories told by the elderly and the media that their poverty and impoverishment are the result of decades of exploitation of their land, rich with natural resources, by outsiders without empowering them as indigenous people. A member of *Tim 15* from Bappeda clearly said, '... the most important thing for Papua in this provincial planning in the long term is how to protect Papuan land so that it remains sustainable while continuing to improve the quality of life of OAP. Simply put, we don't want Papuan land to be crowded with non-Papuan actors while the OAP are not ready (yet)…'. In several conversations, a more assertive and stronger narrative was developed, such as 'if we don't protect our forest, Papuans will not get anything. Non-Papuans will get the benefts. Otherwise, Papuans can still sustainably manage our forest for our livelihoods'.9

### **11.4 Slow Implementation of Green Policies**

To understand the extent to which green policies in Papua Land have been implemented, this study identifes two areas of policy implementation that are considered to represent the main objectives of the green policies: forest conservation and empowerment of OAP. The main threat to the former is unlawful licenses for landbased industries – plantation, mining, and forestry. With regard to the latter, acknowledgement and protection of *adat*-managed land is considered one of the best solutions, given the development situation in Papua Land that is also expected

<sup>9</sup> Interview on 18 February 2020.

to contribute to the frst objective (de Royer et al., 2018).10 Hence, review of landbased industry licenses, followed by reducing or repealing unlawful licenses, and formal acknowledgement of *adat*-managed land were selected as indicators for green policy implementation in the two provinces.

### *11.4.1 Law Enforcement on Land-Based Industry Licenses*

While no signifcant new licenses were granted under the Joko Widodo administration (2014–2024), the study identifes excessive licenses granted during the period of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY) in 2004–2013. The licenses were given based on previous Law No. 32/2004 regarding Subnational Governments ('the Autonomy Law'), whereby the regency/municipal governments still have authorities to issue plantation,11 mining, and forestry licenses. Based on our assessment,12 approximately 169 and 153 permits on mining, plantation, and forestry sectors were issued in Papua and West Papua provinces, respectively, in the period of 2004–2013. These include 34 forestry licenses granted by the Ministry of Forestry and 48 plantation licenses issued by regents (*bupati*). Approximately 86% of 240 mining licenses were issued by *bupatis*, while the remaining licenses were granted by the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources and governors. Most of these companies are not (yet) actively operating and are assumed to be either storing land for the future (known as 'land banking') or stranded.13 Qualitative data obtained through interviews reveal that only few concessionaires have started operating their primary businesses as per the licenses, indicating their strategy in targeting in targeting forests for logging activities.14

Based on the regulations, the licenses can only be granted in non-forest areas (other utilization areas or *area penggunaan lain*/APL). However, some of the concession areas are located in protected areas. Based on our analysis on GIS data, approximately 5.9 million hectares of the area belong to 114 licenses and 123,000 hectares from 33 licenses are located in the protected areas of Papua and West Papua provinces, respectively, between 1994 and 2016. In Papua province, the allocation

<sup>10</sup> Interviews with forestry and green policy expert from Bogor Agricultural University, 4 June 2020, ICEL (Indonesian Center for Environmental Law), 21 May 2020, and advisor of MoEF, 5 May 2020. See also de Royer et al. (2018) on community-based forestry management in Indonesia.

<sup>11</sup> In particular, palm oil refers to the United Nation's Food and Agriculture Agency's (FAO) classifcation system and hence is classifed as subsector of agriculture under plantation licenses, not as a forestry crop (Astuti et al., 2022).

<sup>12</sup>The assessment used unpublished GIS data which contains licenses and forest areas information compiled by Forest Watch Indonesia (FWI) from various sources. In Papua province, the study team also uses SIMTARU or Papua Management Information System for Spatial Planning.

<sup>13</sup> Interviews with informants from Mongabay, 10 June 2020 and Papua Forest Watch, 19 May 2020.

<sup>14</sup> Interviews with informants from Yayasan PUSAKA, 11 May 2020; Mongabay journalist, 10 June 2020; and Papua Forest Watch, 19 May 2020.

for land-based industries is also not in line with the existing green spatial allocation in the 2013–2033 RTRWP.15 Our qualitative interviews also highlight that most of the 'problematic' licenses are located in the southern part of Papua province, particularly in Merauke and Boven Digoel regencies, known as the Merauke Integrated Food and Energy Estate (MIFEE).16 Investigations conducted by the Gecko Project (2019, 2020) revealed fraudulent processes in processing mega project permits in Boven Digoel, Papua, leading to clearing of a vast area of rainforest in the region.

Since 2011, through the issuance of Presidential Instruction (*Instruksi Presiden or Inpres*) No. 10/2011 in May 2011, the central government imposed a policy to protect forest by enacting moratorium of new licenses for primary natural forests and peatlands located in conservation forests, protected forests, production forests (limited protection forests, permanent production forests, production forests that can be converted) and other utilization areas (*area penggunaan lain* or APL) based on Indicated Map of Moratorium of New Licenses. The *Inpres* was valid for two years and have been renewed every two years.17 In September 2018, the government issued *Inpres* No. 8/2018 on moratorium and evaluation of licensing for oil palm plantations and increasing the productivity of oil palm plantation. These policies have constrained the issuance of land-based industry licenses after 2013. Interviews with an offcer from Investment and Integrated One-Stop Services Agency18 and with a forestry expert of Papua Province19 suggest that the moratorium has constrained the oil palm plantation licenses as there are no new licenses granted after the moratorium.

Hence, conducting already granted license review of land-based industries and following up review results with law enforcement are of great signifcance to avoid potential environmental damages and adverse human right impacts in the future. Any attempts to actively review the problematic licenses and to follow up the review results indicate serious commitment in implementing green policies. In this case, local actors – provincial and district governments, NGOs – in collaboration with national-level NGOs and donor organizations have conducted efforts to review land-based licenses. Despite some improvements of license review in West Papua Province, the study fnds that the review process has remained slow and limited improvements have been made in dealing with problematic companies. The study notes that the Energy and Mineral Resources Offce of Papua province conducted license review and discontinued nine expired mining licenses.20 In West Papua, only

<sup>15</sup> Interview with Provincial Papua BAPPEDA staff, 18 February 2020.

<sup>16</sup> Interviews with informants from Yayasan PUSAKA, 11 May 2020, and Papua Forest Watch 19 May 2020. The project was launched by President SBY's administration in 2008 with an ambition to make Merauke District the source of food security and energy for the nation.

<sup>17</sup>The following Inpres were issued with similar mandates with Inpres No. 10/2011: Inpres No. 6/2013, 8/2015, 6/2017, and 5/2019.

<sup>18</sup> Interview on 13 February 2020.

<sup>19</sup> Interview on 18 February 2020.

<sup>20</sup>Five of the companies sued the government in the State Administrative Court (PTUN); two of the cases were accepted, while three others were rejected (TAF, 2020).

the Regent of Sorong, Johny Kamuru, has stopped location permits, environmental permits, and plantation business permits for four palm oil companies located in the territory of the Moi indigenous people.21 In plantation sectors, the West Papua province's Food, Horticulture and Plantation Crops Offce, supported by EcoNusa and other CSOs, has submitted the review results of palm oil plantations in West Papua Province to the National Movement for the Rescue of Natural Resources-Corruption Eradication Commission (*Gerakan Nasional Penyelamatan Sumber Daya Alam Indonesia-Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi* GNPSDA-KPK).22 Based on the review results published in February 2021 (West Papua province's Food, Horticulture and Plantation Crops Offce, 2021), the Regents in South Sorong, Sorong, Teluk Bintuni, Teluk Wondama, and Fakfak have revoked approximately four, four, two, one, and one palm oil plantation licenses respectively or 12 licenses in total (Elisabeth & Hariandja, 2021). But in general, the provincial and district governments, particularly in Papua Province, have not revoked problematic business licenses of companies which are granted under their authorities, i.e., plantation sectors that have caused environmental damage and disrespected indigenous rights. Existing licenses covering concessions in protected areas are still active, including problematic oil palm plantation project in the southern part of Papua Province.

However, NGO actors have been concerned with the continuation to advocate the licensing review process for problematic land-based industries, including the issuance of new permits, considering the changes to the rules after the enactment of Law No.23/3014 which reduced the authority for granting permits at the provincial and district levels.23 The Law No. 23/2014 shifts mining and forestry authorities to grant licenses to the provincial and central level. The Law No. 3/2020 on Mineral and Coal Mining and the Law No. 11/2020 on the Omnibus Law has shifted mining authority back to the Central Government. The regency/municipal governments only hold the authority to issue plantation permits in other utilization areas (*area penggunaan lain* or APL)24 and to provide recommendations for the issuance of mining and forestry permits to date. This means that various initiatives to review permits as an effort to implement green policy in Papua land must be strengthened by efforts to create a conducive policy environment for green policy at the central level.

<sup>21</sup>Based on media coverages reported in KOMPAS (https://regional.kompas.com/ read/2021/09/02/151231078/cabut-izin-perusahaan-sawit-demi-bela-hak-masyarakat-adat-bupatisorong) and CNN (https://www.cnnindonesia.com/nasional/20210830213725-12-687539/ cabut-izin-operasi-bupati-sorong-digugat-perusahaan-sawit).

<sup>22</sup> Interviews with EcoNusa Foundation, 23 January 2020 and Head of West Papua Province Food Crops and Horticulture Offce, 13 February 2020.

<sup>23</sup> Interview on 10 February 2022, 12 February 2022, 18 February 2022, and 13 May 2022.

<sup>24</sup>Based on attachment of Law 23/2014 on Division of Authority between Central and Subnational Government and Law 39/2014 on Plantation, and elaborated in the Attachment I of PP 5/2021 on Risk Based Licensing as implementing regulation of Law 11/2021 (Job Creation Law), the regency/municipal governments still hold the authority to issue plantation, including palm oil permits particularly in other utilization (APL).

Furthermore, the issuance of the new Law on Mineral and Coal Mining (No. 3/2020) and the Omnibus Law on Job Creation (No. 11/2020) may have potentially constrained this activity further. These laws recentralize the authority for issuing and monitoring mining licenses from the provincial governments. Hence, technically the provincial governments are not allowed to issue a provincial-level moratorium or revoke unlawful licenses without any delegation of authority from the central government. The Omnibus Law particularly creates opportunity for the central government to overrule the subnational spatial plans in the case that they are not aligned with national strategic projects (Sembiring et al., 2020). The Omnibus Law which provides a mechanism for legalizing illegal plantations with various administrative fnes and amnesty mechanisms is also feared to have a detrimental effect on protected forests and peatlands (Astuti et al., 2022). By changing the land swap policy into applying administrative fnes and tax amnesty to secure license, the illegal plantations can be granted with forest release certifcate and hence, the Omnibus law is viewed by researchers and conservation organizations to have limited concern over forest restoration mechanism (Astuti et al., 2022, 7).

### *11.4.2 Recognition and Protection of Adat Communities*

Based on the '*adat* forest' scheme as a part of the social forestry program promoted by the Joko Widodo administration since 2014, the frst step of granting the rights to an *adat* community is by acknowledging and protecting the subject community through a local regulation (*peraturan daerah* or *perda*) that must be deliberated and approved by the local legislative council (DPRD). However, despite very strong narrative of *adat* in Papua Land, the number of *perdas* to acknowledge and protect the *adat* communities (*pengakuan dan perlindungan masyarakat hukum adat*, PPMHA) is still very low – only fve out of 42 regencies/municipalities in Papua Land have enacted such regulations, four regencies in West Papua and only one regency in Papua Province, by 2018. Furthermore, a regent/mayor regulation acknowledging the *adat*-managed land (the object) and, if the land is located in the forest area, a Minister of Environment and Forestry decree on *adat* forest must be issued to grant the management to the *adat* community. The progress of this is even poorer, as only two regency governments have issued the regent regulations and no ministerial decree on *adat* forest rights in Papua Land has been issued by 2019.

The study also highlights that development agencies have actively worked in reviewing licenses and promoting *adat* areas. In the review process, fnancially supported by international donor agencies, various development partners in collaboration with local CSOs such as The Asia Foundation (TAF), World Resource Institute (WRI), Indonesian Center for Environmental Law (ICEL), EcoNusa, Mnukwar, Jerat Papua, and World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Indonesia have supported both provincial governments in reviewing land-based industry licenses. These agencies have made progress in building the capacity of CSOs and the provincial governments to conduct license review using a license review tool identifying unlawful mining and

oil palm plantation licenses as discussed above.25 In regard to acknowledgement of *adat* areas, the development partners and local CSOs in West Papua have succeeded in compiling approximately 3.4 million hectares of customary land maps that can be used to be integrated into the revision of the West Papua RTRWP and issuance of *perda* for PPMHA as discussed above26. By October 2021, the revision of RTRWP has included *adat* areas in eight regencies in West Papua province and the provincial government is still discussing the incorporation with the Ministry of Agrarian Reform and Spatial Planning.27

In addition, the slow implementation of green policies in the two provinces is also indicated by limited budgetary support for green sectors such as the environment and forestry, agriculture, and marine affairs. Based on analysis of their 2015–2020 provincial budgets, the total budget allocations related to green policies in Papua and West Papua have averaged only 3% and 5% of total expenditures, respectively, and most of them come from earmarked transfers such as the Reforestation Fund and Special Allocation Fund. According to offcials in West Papua, this limited allocation has prompted them to cooperate with development partners. Qualitative interviews with key informants28 also reveal limited change in terms of Papua and West Papua provincial government programs and activities after the enactment of the green policies. They emphasized the fact that the government are still running the same programs as before the policy. There are no new programs, methods, or improved budgets implemented by the relevant offces to support the implementation of the green policy.

In the context of a strong narrative of *adat* role as well as strong practices of customary land arrangement, it is expected that *adat* leaders will help protecting their lands from land-based investments and promoting the recognition of *adat* law. However, *adat* leaders do not always support the idea to reject the land-based investment and to clarify their *adat* territories. Qualitative interviews with *adat* leaders29 generally show their enthusiasm for the idea of green policies, with strong emphasis that the conservation program does not prevent the community from utilizing natural resources for their welfare, and hence, *adat* leaders' perspectives are divided between those who reject investment and ask for full control over natural resources, those who welcome investment to improve their welfare, and those who want both development and welfare for OAP (see also Cahyono et al., 2020). The efforts of companies to provide tangible incentives and give false and partial information to obtain the approval of traditional leaders are one of the reasons why some *adat* leaders eventually choose to support land-based investment in Papua (Cahyono et al., 2020; The Gecko Project & Mongabay, 2019b). The situation of unclear land tenure

<sup>25</sup> Interviews with informants from EcoNusa Foundation, 23 January 2020 and Head of West Papua Province Food Crops and Horticulture Offce, 13 February 2020.

<sup>26</sup>Based on FGD results with NGOs in Manokwari involved in adat mapping task force, 10 February 2020.

<sup>27</sup> Interview with a member of adat mapping task force, 30 October 2021.

<sup>28</sup> Interviews with Bappeda offcers and from development partners, 17 and 18 February 2020.

<sup>29</sup> Interview on 5, 17, and 20 February 2020.

196

and ownership confict in Papua land also provide *adat* leaders with opportunities to get cash or any form of compensations from those who will purchase the land. This is a common practice that settlement money for land purchase in Papua is rather uncertain as any strong fgures among and between clan could ask for the compensation.

Communities also have varying perspectives on land-based investments and the extent to which they conserve forests for welfare. A study by Cahyono et al. (2020) identifes cases of protests by *adat* communities against oil palm plantations as well as those in *adat* communities who wanted to get out of poverty immediately and gave up their land for investment, causing tensions and divisions among *adat* communities. Sophie Cao (2020; The Gecko Project & Mongabay, 2019a), an anthropologist who researched the Marind Tribe in Merauke also points out different and varied perspectives of young generation of *adat* regarding the operation of oil-palm investment in their land. She fnds young people who support palm oil and want a modern life as well as young people who want to protect rituals and nature and she also recognizes young people who want to adapt and change culture to be able to survive with progress while still maintaining their control over natural resources. As also a case in how *adat* leaders gave permits to release lands, the studies also explain the practice of companies to provide partial and false information to communities regarding their rights and consequences in giving their land to investments (The Gecko Project & Mongabay, 2019a) and give false promises to pay for school children's education, facilitate *adat* own communities' plantation, and pay money rent to each clan, alluring some groups of communities to choose selling their land for investment (Cahyono et al., 2020). Both studies (Cahyono et al., 2020; The Gecko Project & Mongabay, 2019a) highlight that the release of forest for land-based investment does not only causes loss of food sources and livelihoods of *adat* communities, but also affects their value and support systems, traditions, rituals, languages, religion, and local knowledge.

In addition, civil society groups continue to strive to promote recognition and protection of OAP in a rational and constitutional manner by empowering indigenous people including providing technical facilitation for mapping *adat* territories and advocating for regulations on the recognition of *adat* territories. In Papua land, this recognition of *adat* territories has been made possible with the special autonomy status of Papua and West Papua Provinces. Article 4 of the Special Autonomy (*Otonomi Khusus* or *Otsus*) Law (No. 21/2001, reiterated in the Law No. 2/2021) and its explanation note provide additional authorities to the provincial government of Papua, including in utilizing its natural resources and managing conservation. In accordance with the Otsus Law, the provincial government of Papua issued special autonomy regulations (*peraturan daerah khusus or perdasus*) No. 21/2008 on Sustainable Forest Management in Papua Province, No. 22/2008 on Natural Resource Protection and Management of Papua's Customary Legal Communities (Masyarakat Hukum *Adat*, MHA), and No. 23/2008 on Traditional Rights (*Hak Ulayat*) of MHA and Individual Rights of Papua's MHA. These regulations stipulate that MHA in Papua province has rights over the natural forests based on each customary (*adat*) area and authorize the provincial and local governments to grant

utilization land and forest rights to the MHAs. Nonetheless, these regulations have not been effectively implemented as the Ministry of Forestry (and later, the Ministry of Environment and Forestry) has not issued the norms, standards, procedures and criteria (*norma, standar, prosedur, dan kriteria,* or NSPK) as central government's authorization to the provincial government of Papua in managing these concurrent authorities. Hence, authority over the forestry sector in Papua and West Papua is practically the same with other provinces in Indonesia. These efforts are also hindered by CSOs' limited working areas and funding sources that rely on the support from development partners, shortage of human resources and technical capacity in terms of facilitation and standardized mapping, so that maps of *adat* territories can be optimally integrated into regency/municipality city spatial planning.

### **11.5 Support for Land-Based Investment in Papua Land**

Obstacles in controlling land-based industry practices are beyond development partners' and CSOs' supports. The study identifes those powerful actors who have promoted land-based investment and resisted license reforms that would negatively impact their operations.

Based on credible investigative reports (Cahyono et al., 2020; The Gecko Project, 2019, 2020a, b; The Gecko Project & Mongabay, 2019a, b, 2020a, b; Ginting & Pye, 2011) and interviews with key informants,30 the large companies granted the land-based industry licenses are very powerful. The companies offer strong incentives for *adat* leaders to support them and release their lands by giving them monthly allowances and entertaining them with stays in nice hotels, women and 'going to bars'.31 The Gecko Project revealed the involvement of a head of *adat* leaders in Boven Digoel in ensuring that one palm oil company was granted a license. These companies often conduct fraudulent procedures and are able to obtain permits from the state which appear to be 'legal' but in principle are illegitimate and harm OAP (Cahyono et al., 2020; Chao, 2020; The Gecko Project & Mongabay, 2019a, b, 2020b).

Some members of regency DPRD and government offcials are often behind the investments, as they gain direct benefts from investments by receiving cash from granting licenses in the plantation sector, logging revenues, and land clearing for plantations (Cahyono et al., 2020; The Gecko Project, 2019; The Gecko Project & Mongabay, 2019b; Resosudarmo, 2005). They have strong interests in opening their regencies for land-based investments such as palm oil or mining. The investigative report from the Gecko Project (2019) and interviews with members of *Tim 15*

<sup>30</sup> Interviews with informants from Yayasan PUSAKA, 11 May 2020; Mongabay, 10 June 2020; and Papua Forest Watch, 19 May 2020.

<sup>31</sup> Information from Webinar 'Modus Tipu-tipu Perusahaan Ekspansi Perkebunan Sawit di Tanah Masyarakat Adat Papua', Greenpeace Indonesia, 7 August 2020 and Webinar 'Mengungkap Kejahatan Korporasi di Papua', TUK Indonesia, 30 June 2020.

identify the involvement of *bupati* in releasing their land for palm oil corporations.32 For instance, the Regent of Merauke for the 2000–2010 period, John Gluba Gebze, supported the central government's agenda in releasing land for the MIFEE project. The Gecko Project's investigative report (2019) also shows the involvement of the Regent of Boven Digoel, Yusak Yaluwo, in granting licenses for palm oil corporations in this regency known as 'Tanah Merah'. Both *bupatis* granted licenses in areas that were not in line with the existing spatial allocations in the Papua 2013–2033 RTRWP. The study does not indicate any signifcant evidence of central government measures and action in addressing this issue.

Several major structural obstacles present challenges to the implementation of the review process. One main threat is the coalition between national and local actors of land-based industries. Companies have affliations with powerful actors at local and national levels. The Gecko Project reports (2019, 2020a, b) as well as other investigative reports from Pusaka (2020) and Down to Earth (n.d., 2012) point out that some large palm oil plantations received many concessions during the New Order era and had strong affliations with the ruling party and military commanders at that time. Investigative reports on companies granted licenses also identify many other groups, including medium-scale companies, that are linked to various political parties and infuential fgures in the government. MIFEE is a very good example to identify the powerful network behind the issue of licensing for land-based investment in Papua. The project was launched by President SBY's administration in 2008 with an ambition to make Merauke regency the source of food security for the nation. Based on analysis of data from various sources from Down To Earth and Pusaka Foundation as well as a report by Longgena Ginting and Oliver Pye (2011), the companies with MIFEE licenses – both local and international companies – are linked to various political parties and infuential political actors since the New Order era.

Furthermore, The Joko Widodo administration continues to maintain a strong perspective for investment and economic growth in Papua Land, as indicated in the National Medium-Term Development Plan (*Rencana Pembangunan Jangka Menengah Nasional* or RPJMN) for 2020–2024. At the macro level, until 2018 Papua and West Papua Provinces only contributed around 1.9% of the total national GDP. This condition is considered as a form of inequality among regions and for 2024 the government has planned to increase the contribution of Papua Land to 2.1%. The RPJMN for 2020–2024 has set an ambitious economic growth target in Papua and West Papua Provinces of 6.5% and 7%, respectively, higher than the national growth target of 5.7%–6%. Although they are still high, civil society advocacy has successfully lowered these targets from the ones indicated in the initial 'technocratic draft' of the RPJMN of 9% economic growth in Papua Land. To meet

<sup>32</sup>As mentioned in the previous section, the authority of the regent in issuing plantation business permits (IUP) within the regency – not a recommendation – is still valid today. Amendments to the 2014 Regional Government Law do not change/transfer the regency's authority in plantation/agricultural affairs. This is also in line with Law 39/2014 on Plantations, where the Regent is still authorized to issue IUPs in district areas, particularly in APL area.

these targets, the central government needs to develop Papua Land through development of large-scale industries and major investment schemes. It plans to accelerate development in the island through seven major projects over the next fve years, such as developing new city corridors and centres of national strategic activities and continuing to build connectivity infrastructure such as 'air bridges', main port networks, and roads (Trans-Papua) as well as a plan to continue food estate projects. As a part of post-COVID-19 economic recovery, the central government continues to build Food Estate project in southern part of Papua province at 2.6 million hectares (Elisabeth, 2021). This indicates that the central government still aims to develop Papua based on land-based industries that attract the involvement of large national and international companies.

The perspective on economic growth as development measures are also shared by relevant offces in provincial and regency governments. An interview with a member of *Tim 15* from Bappeda33 also revealed that regency governments have complained about the Papua Province 2100 Vision and RTRW 2013. During the dissemination of RTRW 2013 to regency governments, representatives of the regency governments shared their concerns of not being able to develop and invite big investments due to the enactment of the two green policies. Offcers from the Investment and Energy offces in the provincial governments have also questioned the green policies' agenda, given investment targets from the central government.34 They are also concerned about how to reduce poverty without investments.

### **11.6 The Absence of Broad-Based Political Support**

Another obstacle is the absence of broader-based political support to strengthen the coalitions for reform. Despite the success of coalitions between international development partners and a few numbers of bureaucrats in enacting environmental policies in both provinces, they did not bring together a wide range of different actors who have interests and infuence either to promote or to disrupt the green policies, ensuring these actors support the policies. This has hampered the implementation of green policies.

Our fndings show that, by and large, there was no systematic effort to build a broader coalition, to actively engage with other stakeholders, even within the provincial government itself, and to deal with potential blockers of reforms. The foremost weakness is that the green policy formulation process in both provinces did not engage with other provincial offces, especially offces with an investment scope of work and function. Thirteen out of the Tim 15 who went through the systematic capacity and coalition building in Papua Province were Bappeda offcers. The involvement of two participants from the Investment and Environment offces was

<sup>33</sup> Interview on 9 and 12 June 2020.

<sup>34</sup> Interview on 11, 13, and 20 February 2020.

insuffcient to build political engagement with those two agencies. In West Papua Province, the discussions on both Conservation Province and the Manokwari Declaration were limited to top leadership in the provincial government without systematic capacity and coalition building within the government, including with Bappeda and the legislature. The engagement of the regency governments in deliberating green policies in Papua and West Papua was very limited, to say the least.

There was also only a limited process to build a strong coalition with potential allies: local CSOs, church-based organizations, and adat communities, including with members of the Papuan People's Assembly (MRP). Although local CSOs have recently engaged and collaborated with development partners and provincial governments as discussed above, their involvement in the deliberation and enactment of the green policies was limited. Local CSOs initially rejected the Conservation Province idea, stating that their preferred approach for sustainable development – empowering the OAPs while sustainably managing the forests – was not considered and was systematically excluded. Despite the involvement of local CSOs in the Manokwari Declaration, the green policy formulation lacked time to build a more deliberative process by discussing the ideas and objectives of the declaration with local CSOs. In Papua Province, local CSOs were only consulted in the process of formulating the 2013–2033 RTRWP without systematic efforts to build strong alliances with the CSOs. The completion of the FCO project in the end of 2013 further discontinued the process to disseminate the Papua Province 2100 Vision to broader groups outside the government. It is also important to note that the green formulation process in both provinces also did not consider engagement with church-based organizations, which have long played a strong role in humanitarian missions in Papua.

Building a broader coalition has also become a challenge on its own, since some key actors, such as development agencies and reform-oriented bureaucrats, were not keen to engage with other important stakeholders that have strong interests in investment and opposed the Green Development agenda. These actors include the central government, provincial and regency governments, regency legislative councils (DPRDs), land-based industries, regents, and business groups. The central and regency governments showed little support for Green Development and prioritized opening investments in Papua Land. The limited engagement with these opposing actors may be because they took no visible actions to terminate the process of Green Policies formulation in the two provinces. The nature of these actors may contribute to this; they did not think that the declarations were important and might hamper their 'business as usual'. This lack of systematic engagement with opposing actors resulted in a lack of political support from powerful actors that have interests in hindering green developments.

### **11.7 Conclusion and Recommendation**

The fndings of this study suggest that the reform is mainly driven by development partners, limited numbers of bureaucrats, supported by the governors, and networks of CSOs. These small coalitions were successful in focusing their effort to enact environmental policies in Papua and West Papua provinces. The green development narrative and its related terms such as sustainable development and customary forest offer strong political incentives for top leaderships in the provinces to support the idea. Furthermore, potential fnancial incentives for the provinces by protecting their forests also create more incentives for the leaders to adopt the policies.35 However, the small coalitions failed to operationalize the policies, as indicated by slow implementation in enforcing lawfulness of land-based industry licenses and in issuing regulations to acknowledge and protect *adat*-managed lands, which are crucial in operationalizing the green policies in both provinces. Several main reasons were identifed, suggesting signifcant challenges faced by the green actors: the existence of wide-array powerful actors encompassing central and local actors with vested economic and political interests and the absence of a broader political support base. This include the presence of *adat* and local leaders who support landbased investments and central government's unaligned priority on economic growth and the enactment of the Omnibus Law and the change of license regulations that potentially impede green policy implementation in the provinces. This indicates the complexity and heterogeneity of actors who hinder and support green policy and hence, suggests the importance to align green policy supports from all administrative levels, including from opposing parties.

The study identifes four recommendations, with an overarching recommendation for the green actors to expand their coalition with other development actors at all levels and to increase their power as described in detail below.

First, the study suggests that central government shows high priority on economic growth in developing Papua land as well as the potential negative impact of Omnibus law and recentralization of license regulations on green policy implementation. This indicates the importance to focus the policy change on the national level to create enabling environment for green policy implementation in both provinces. It is particularly important to revisit the Omnibus Law to ensure that various mechanisms, e.g., administrative fnes and amnesty in the law are not used to legalize the illegal expansion of land-based industries at the expense of forest and environmental concerns. In particular, Astuti et al. (2022:10) have called for reorienting environmental legislation and the Omnibus Law 'to include greater scrutiny of, and punitive actions against, the illegal expansion of large plantations'.

<sup>35</sup>There is a growing opportunity for local government to tap the various climate funds both public sourced including Environmental Fiscal Transfer and Environmental Fund or market-based climate fund such as carbon fund. Local governments can access these funds by participating in either the result-based payment (RBP) scheme, carbon trading and other schemes.

Second, the study indicates the slow implementation to recognize *adat* areas despite the relevance of this regulation to increase land access for OAP welfare and control over their land while still allocating state forest for community management. Hence this study recommends the green actors to support the regency-level actors, to accelerate issuance of the *perda* PPMHA and local-level regulations on *adat*-managed areas, particularly in non-forest areas (APL) that do not require authorization of the MoEF. The national-level advocacy will also be important to resolve the issuance of NSPK for Papua and West Papua provinces.

Third, the study identifes that southern part of Papua is where most problematic land-based investments are located and hence it is important for the green actors to focus on the respective region to limit the operation of these businesses to expand in forest areas and disrespect *adat* rights over their lands. At the national level, development organizations and national NGOs could provide support to create enabling environment to conduct license reviews and follow up the results to advocate sanctions against the investments to central government actors such as GNPSDA-KPK. This includes supporting One Map Policy and investigative journalism and studies to disclose development policies and practices, including fraudulent licenses, that are against the spirit of the green policies in order to draw public, policymaker, and media attention, locally, nationally, and globally.

Fourth, to explore engagement with actors who promote land-based investment. The green actors need to engage with other political and business actors that have competing interests to fnd incentives for the latter to promote sustainable business practices to ensure that businesses operate in an accountable, transparent, and ethical manner. For example, enforcing environmental, social, and governance standards that linked to fnancial institutions investing in the businesses would limit environmental degradation and increase social benefts for local people.

### **References**

**Yulia Indrawati Sari** is a lecturer at International Relations Dept., Parahyangan Catholic University (UNPAR) Bandung. She is also a board of advisory member of AKATIGA Foundation, a research-based NGO in Bandung. She completed her doctoral dissertation at Crawford School of Public Policy, ANU on Community Driven Development in Papua Province.

**Open Access** This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

The images or other third party material in this chapter are included in the chapter's Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the chapter's Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.

### **Chapter 12 Environmental Governance as Knowledge Co-production: The Emergence of Permaculture Movements in Indonesia**

### **Maharani Hapsari**

**Abstract** Current academic debate witnessed the salience of looking at the epistemic dimension of environmental governance. In such setting, this study learns from how knowledge co-production works in the emergence of permaculture movements in Indonesia. The method of this study departs from the concept of knowledge co-production and situates it within the broader literatures on social movement and counter-hegemonic politics. The data is based on the experiences of four permaculture communities in Indonesia, namely Bumi Langit Institute, Sendalu Permaculture, IDEP Foundation, and Jiwa Damai. This study argues that the formation of permaculture movements in Indonesia involves negotiated boundaries among different ways of knowing in the epistemic relations surrounding permaculture practices. The critical distancing that develops between the movements and the hegemonic knowledge structure seeks to transform agro-industrial knowledge practices toward an alternative knowledge system. The quest of epistemic leadership is constructed through the porous boundaries of knowledge co-production toward defning what permaculture means as a collective project.

**Keywords** Knowledge co-production · Environmental governance · Hegemony · Permaculture · Social movements · Epistemic relation

### **12.1 Introduction**

The importance of understanding the political dimensions of epistemic relations in environmental governance literatures is increasingly recognized (van der Molen, 2018; Lemos & Agrawal, 2006; Jasanoff, 2004a; Miller & Edwards, 2001). Environmental governance has mostly discussed about institutional framework that is authoritative to manage the process and consequences of environmental change

M. Hapsari (\*)

Department of International Relations, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Yogyakarta, Indonesia e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
<sup>©</sup> The Author(s) 2023

A. Triyanti et al. (eds.), *Environmental Governance in Indonesia*, Environment & Policy 61, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-15904-6\_12

for human society at multiple scales (Jasanoff & Martello, 2004; Lipschutz & Kütting, 2009). How environmental problems is known through different lens and regulated within specifc knowledge schemes, however, often lacks attention.

Current environmental governance literatures have covered the question of knowledge production in two respects. The frst strand of literature defnes environmental governance as knowledge institutionalization. These literatures rely on the presumption of knowledge authority. The presence of expert and professional knowledge supports the methodological foundation of governance practices (Miller & Edwards, 2001). This power to know is central to the conditions of governing because knowledge is assumed to be concentrated in the presence of major institutions, mainly the government (Paavaola, 2007). Academic institutions are constitutive to such mechanism provided their truth-claim authority within the broad culture of scientifc knowledge (Eicken et al., 2021). Knowledge dissemination works within the hierarchical structure in societal relations, between the knowledge producer and the knowledge receiver. Knowledge producer is often treated as having relative authority in the formation and internalization of particular rules. Such mechanisms also shape the relations of the knowledge producers and knowledge receivers that demands participation by the knowledge receivers to make the institutions legitimate (Paavaola, 2005). Likewise, this strand of literatures has also discussed some pathologies of institutional formation that accompany governance practices. This is related to the ability of the institutions to achieve particular normative goals given some institutional limits, such as lack of coordination, fragmentation of instruments and process, and substantive complexity. All these limits are considered affecting incentives that drive individual's choice or the consolidation of collective arrangements. Furthermore, it determines the ability of particular institutional arrangement to ensure coherence, centralization, and compliance (Chambers & Green, 2006).

The second strand of literature sees environmental governance as knowledge mobilization. It assumes that knowledge emerges in a decentralized manner, where there is no central authority that drives the formation of knowledge. Such claims can be situated within the broader critics of the core-periphery dichotomy (Hoppers, 2000) and the intellectual attempts to decolonize knowledge domination in the North-South relations (Grosfoguel, 2002). Such position argued for an area beyond the trickle-down and transfer model, which constitutes hybrid spaces in understanding knowledge relationship (Van Kerkhoff & Lebel, 2006). The making of environmental governance involves understanding situated ways of knowing and the particularity of problems facing human-ecology nexus (Collof et al., 2020; Ingram, 2017). In such a decentralized and plural setting, knowledge is produced scattered in various loci, and very often develops quite independently from each other as an epistemic undertaking. Such knowledge is mostly associated with the presence of civil society movements seeking to redefne the epistemic relations driven by statecentered knowledge practice (Ford, 2003). Knowledge travels and transcends various forms of life and navigates various locals. It also problematizes the generalization of science, which has often been treated as a dominant force in the process of legitimizing environmental governance (Bernauer & gampfer, 2013). The impacts of knowledge production are examined not in terms of the scale of knowledge internalization and socialization, but in the way it is able to trigger individualized strategies of knowing without necessary leading to large-scale institutionalization. Critics on hegemonic modernity in a Latin American context illustrated how hybridity and heterogeneity are instrumental to the re-articulation of modern political power (Coletta & Raftopoulos, 2018). The contextualized aspect of knowledge, in this regard, is considered much more important than the aspiration toward an overarching knowledge framework that has universal character. The collaborative governance involves the use of the terms such as lay knowledge (Moran & Rau, 2016) and local knowledge in their interaction with positivist science, which contributes to the dynamics of knowledge mobilization (Grineski, 2006).

The existing literatures still provide rooms to elaborate the formation of knowledge that constructs environmental governance by considering the interactions between knowledge institutionalization and knowledge mobilization theses. This study, therefore, seeks to deepen the understanding of environmental governance departing from literatures on knowledge co-production, recognizing the dynamic interactions of knowledge institutionalization and knowledge mobilization, which characterize contemporary landscapes of environmental governance making. Knowledge co-production examines knowledge in its situated-ness against specifc socio-political background. Furthermore, it examines the consequences of knowledge production beyond linear logic and very often the deterministic conceptual trajectory by looking at the dialectical aspects of knowledge production as co-constitutive processes. It also seeks to understand its tensions with the other evolving knowledge systems that seek to articulate their infuence in the functioning of social order.

This study refects upon the emergence of permaculture movements in transforming agro-industrial practices in Indonesia. Some questions that motivate this study are as follows: What are the limits of agro-industrial knowledge practices confronting contemporary social and environmental problems? In what ways have dialectical relations shape hegemonic knowledge and its altering forces? What does it take to advance knowledge co-production project in responding to socio-ecological limits of modern society? This study argues the limits of agro-industrial knowledge system as a common sense (Gramsci, 1971) are shaped by critical refection of the epistemic beings around which socio-environmental problems are being identifed. Multiple delineations of knowledge boundaries allow contestation over hegemonic knowledge through knowledge framing, practice, and knowledge enculturation.

To deliver the arguments, this chapter is divided into fve sections. The frst section elaborates a theoretical framework on the intersection of knowledge coproduction and alter-knowledge that seek to transform the limits of hegemonic knowledge toward its normative trajectory. The second section discusses the research method and data analysis method. The third section elaborates the diverging perceptions of knowledge crisis internal to the hegemonic agro-industrial knowledge structure and the emerging foresights toward alternative ways of knowing. The fourth section elaborates the power dynamics of knowledge co-production in which permaculture movements seek to infuence each other through their knowledge practices as they seek common project. The ffth section discusses the implications of knowledge co-production and challenges to environmental governance project.

### *12.1.1 Knowledge Co-production and Alter-Knowledge: A Conceptualization*

This study seeks to explore the question of environmental governance from the viewpoint of knowledge co-production. As knowledge is never neutral from power relations, it always represents a particular set of political standing upon which it justifes the way to respond to environmental problems and produces authoritative impacts. The methodological framework of this study incorporates the concept of knowledge co-production introduced by Sheila Jasanoff, critics of hegemony introduced by Antonio Gramsci (1971), and the theory of social movements by Alberto Melucci (1995). Knowledge co-production is an idiom that emphasizes the "social dimensions of cognitive commitments and understandings as well as the epistemic and material correlates of social formations" (Jasanoff, 2004, p. 3). The level of social aggregation and the kind of institutional spaces are formative to such coproduction (Jasanoff, 2004, p. 5). Furthermore, knowledge co-production entails the stabilization of objects, the emergence of knowledge that becomes established among various competing knowledge, the formation of community of practice, and the presence of legitimate and meaningful cultural practices (Jasanoff, 2004, p. 5). Those elements are mutually constitutive shaping its authoritative effects in regulating the complex relations of human and their existence within the realm of nature as social construct.

Hegemonic knowledge is understood in this study as a product of knowledge coproduction characterized with the commodifcation of the ecology, the separation of the economic realm from popular will, privatization of the public interest as well as the densifcation of transnational economic relations (Carroll, 2010). Hegemonic knowledge is composed of the diverse elements of state, local, and scientifc knowledge. The relations among these elements most of the times are shaped by fractured construction rather than a well-consolidated structure. This creates a contingent power locus in which a transformative knowledge project is possible to pursue (Robbins, 2000).

The political aspect of knowledge production is situated within the broader framework of counter-hegemonic political struggle. Borrowing Gramsci, science and technology is integral in the production of common sense and unquestioned hegemonic knowledge practice (Gramsci, 1971). The normalization of science and technology has the affrmation effects toward public beliefs on what are considered as foundational matrices of the socio-ecological order. Gramscian view of hegemony emphasizes the everyday production of common sense that always involves tensions between class domination and the resistance of subaltern groups (Stoddart,

2007). The stabilization of certain epistemic position from the viewpoint of hegemony involves the coercive exercise of power as well as consent of the governed (Gramsci, 1971; Perkins, 2011, 2012). What sustains hegemonic knowledge is the ability of the knowledge structure and superstructure to orchestrate consent of the subaltern.

The rise of counter-hegemonic movement refects the capacity of the dominated groups to build leadership, challenging the dominant class in alliance with other subjugated social elements (Andreucci, 2019). Changes within the knowledge structure are possible when the existing structure is unable to endure crisis internal to its epistemological limitations. The rise of organic intellectual, whose position is critical towards the re-conception of dominant knowledge practices (Meek, 2015), is central to the formation of an alternative knowledge system.

Embedded in the counter-hegemony is practice of opposition, yet counterhegemony needs to be understood beyond romanticizing resistance. Practices of resistance may include behavior, action, and idea to undermine the material and symbolic components that legitimize the hegemonic structures. Counter-hegemony is concerned among others with the articulation of symbolic challenges and challenges to the distribution of material resources and the formation of a collective subject claiming for political power (Filc, 2021). Counter-hegemonic project seeks to destabilize the legitimacy and authority of the dominant order, involving the diversity of subordinate experience and resistances that is increasingly transnational, intersectional, and mediated in terms of how to reclaim the commons through programmatic actions and democratic forms of communication (Carroll, 2010).

The re-organization of knowledge by permaculture communities is assumed to come into being within the logic of confict, solidarity, and system breaching (Melucci, 1995). These confict and solidarity elements of social movements are formative to the mediation of knowledge co-production in the socially constituted relations. This study discusses the social convergence and divergence arising out of the permaculture movements. Knowledge co-production develops against the backdrop of particular political rationale. It also represents certain position in relation to the existing way of knowing, which can sustain, challenge or alter its elements. The emergence of permaculture movements in Indonesia is discussed as an indication of knowledge crisis associated with hegemonic knowledge practices that bear the effects of unabated social and environmental problems.

### **12.2 Research Method**

This study employs the interpretive analysis to examine the experiences of four permaculture communities in Indonesia, namely Bumi Langit Institute in Yogyakarta, Sendalu Permaculture in West Java, and Indonesian Development of Education and Permaculture (IDEP Foundation) and Jiwa Damai, located in Bali.

Sendalu Permaculture was established in 2017 by Gibran Tragari, a university graduate practicing sustainable living in his resident in Depok, West Java Province.

Bumi Langit Institute was established in 2006 in Yogyakarta Special Region by Iskandar Waworuntu. It starts as family own land developed as permaculture learning center as well as community workshops attended by various domestic and foreign participants. IDEP Foundation is located in Bali Province. It was established following the Indonesian 1998 fnancial crisis, with the initial aim to strengthen self-suffciency in providing food, shelter, energy and other needs of the local community throughout the economic recovery process. Jiwa Damai was established in 2010 by Margret Rueffer and is located in Badung, Bali Province. These communities present a converging commitment toward permaculture knowledge in their very diverse communal trajectories. The profle of each permaculture community is presented in Table 12.1.

These communities were chosen for their unique contribution to the diversity of counter-hegemony in Indonesia as practices of resistance and the way counterhegemonic struggles are situated across different levels of political agency as a collective project. The selection was not merely on the basis of the scope of audience exposed to their political claims, but also on the substantive questioning of the dominant practices through both symbolic and material components of resistance at play.

Data collection is conducted through desk research including in-depth media coverage by various organizations with the founders and members of the respective permaculture communities. The materials for online data collection are gathered by consulting social media platforms and websites developed by each community and recent literatures covering selected communities as case study. The analysis identifes the construct of the hegemonic knowledge as interpreted by selected permaculture movements. It also defnes how knowledge co-production emerges through the process of knowledge framing, knowledge practice, knowledge accumulation, and knowledge dissemination. The study further the fuid formation of knowledge boundaries as the movements seeks to advance their permaculture projects at both ideological and practical levels.

**Table 12.1** Profle of selected permaculture communities in Indonesia

Source: Compiled by Author

### *12.2.1 Agro-industrial Knowledge and Its Contradictions*

The expansion of agro-industrial knowledge has been a common sense in most industrializing societies. Industrial agriculture is seen as an integral part of modernization of agrarian society in Indonesia that delivers the needs of the population for foods, and provides job opportunities and access to commodity market for rural population. For government, economic growth driven by agricultural sector remains an important element of the national development strategy. This is particularly in the context of addressing poverty in the transition from primary to secondary to tertiary economic growth trajectories. This has also been inseparable from the exponential growth of the world population associated with demands of foods in its quantity and quality. The process is being normalized through the introduction of industrial technology, massive investment, the capacity of industrial employment, and the integration of university-supported research programs that give a way for the dissemination of agricultural innovation.

Along with such processes, there has been a long debate on the impacts of industrial agriculture on the society as well as on the relations of humans and agrarian livelihoods. Agricultural industrialization with its knowledge practice has changed the ecological landscapes and its social and environmental components massively (McCarthy & Zen, 2009; Pichler, 2015). Moreover, modern consumer food culture produces some problems such as unabated pollution from plastic materials for packaging, the use of chemical substance on the land, and debate around the consumption of genetically modifed organism (Yngfalk, 2016). These have fostered initiatives around sustainable agriculture. Permaculture came as a growing alternative that is envisioned to provide another trajectory in response to the limits of industrial agriculture in sustaining the future ecological and social and economic bases of the population.

Growing involvement in the permaculture movement in response to shared perception of knowledge crisis is associated with the limits of industrial modes of production in the agricultural sector. There are three intertwined crises that are perceived by permaculture movements as challenges to agricultural modernization practices. This is related to how the connection of human and the ecosystem are being disrupted, how social relation is being reorganized, and how the individual capacity to cope with risks of vulnerability from industrial impacts is being challenged.

The frst crisis is described as the dissociation of human from nature in which industrial society is superior to the natural system. In their public statements, permaculture communities under study shared similar views that the introduction of modern technology and massive land use and the use of non-organic materials gradually limit the regenerative capacity of land resources in supporting the future industrial needs. In responding to the immediate needs of land use, industrial agriculture is described as more inclined toward land expansion since the land resources regenerative and recovery capacity tends to go slower than the pressing needs to produce market commodities. In a larger scale, pressure to expand land use in various cases has also led to the gradual degradation of the soil and the displacement of local communities in the establishment of mega projects. For Bumi Langit Institute, the alienation of human from nature has been accompanied by socially exploitative practices in the agricultural employment, environmental destruction, and other forms of social pathologies. This also appears as undesirable consequences of overextraction and unmanaged disposal of agricultural material and resources throughout its production cycle (Waworuntu, 2017).

The second crisis is situated in the socio-cultural setting of agro-industrial society. Deeply ingrained consumer culture sustained by market dependence put the population as the consumers of industrial commodities. With the decreasing capability of the population to produce their own foods, the role of industrial agriculture in sustaining food consumerism is increasingly important (Tragari, 2020a, b). Some contradictions have appeared in this process. Food consumption, in particular, is not only a utilitarian practice. Cultural and religious values embraced by communities shape their beliefs on what is considered spiritually desirable living practices. For Bumi Langit Institute, consuming agro-industrial materials is believed to have profound impacts on the quality of individual spiritual and religiosity. Bad food consumption is argued to lead to poor health condition and negative social behaviors and it is against the religious principles (Waworuntu, 2017). Such cultural tension has been quite infuential in driving more awareness of the impacts of industrial agriculture.

The third crisis is associated with the weakening of social ties and solidarity. In the view of Sendalu Permaculture, collectivity and communalism Indonesian culture has gradually diminished (Tragari, 2020a, b). Modern society with their individualistic character is believed to lose their social bonds in a way that disrupts the roots of solidarity. Industrial society is argued to have exacerbated the culture of individual pragmatism around consumer-oriented production. The gaps in the conditions of life of farmers, workers, and landowner also lead to deeper social inequality. There are also references to how workers have lived below the wage standard while being exposed to health risks and nutrition defcit in their everyday workplace (Waworuntu, 2017). Against such backdrop of crises, these four permaculture movements are seeking to transform human activities towards an alternative path that is more sustainable.

### *12.2.2 The Making of Epistemic Boundaries*

The everyday practice of permaculture communities forms the delineation of epistemic boundaries. It centers on the emerging counter-discourse that allows the participants to create certain distance from knowledge practices that they are criticizing. It also involves deliberate claims through which permaculture movements construct an alternative defnition of human relations to nature (particularly to land as the component of living system), active construction of collective sense of belonging through being parts of communities of practice, as well as the mutually constitutive elements of rules and consent among individual participants.

### *12.2.3 Redefning Human Relations to Nature*

The formation of alternative to agro-industrial knowledge is informed by different sources of knowledge references these communities adhere to. For Bumi Langit Institute, such transformation must conform to the *sunnatullah* of Islamic teaching. Iskandar embrace Islamic teachings since the year of 2000, and built Bumi Langit based on Islamic teachings. The main reference is Al-Quran, especially its elaboration on *halalan thayyiban* behavior, including consumptions. It then further derives Islamic teachings on fairness, justice, and care for nature (Jaya, 2017). Bumi Langit Institute uses extensive scientifc research to understand the impacts of non-organic agriculture on the human body. They also highlighted the beneft of food nutrition coming from traditional agriculture method to both physical and mental aspects of human and environmental health. Beyond short-term or technical remedy, knowledge practice is oriented toward structural transformation that embeds in the internalization of a sustainable way of living and changing lifestyle.

For Sendalu Permaculture, permaculture practices are ways to rebuild community engagement that is based on managing land and livelihood around solidarity, minimalism, and zero-waste lifestyle (Sjafari, 2019). The founder of Sendalu Permaculture mentioned the infuence of a movie titled "Quite Revolution" and books by Michael Pollan such as "Second Nature", "In Defense of Food", "Second Nature", "The Omnivore's Dilemma", and "The Botany of Desire" as some important references that shape the intellectual philosophy of the movement (Ramadhini, 2018).

Sendalu Permaculture shares its view with Bumi Langit Institute, which brings religious values, mainly Islamic values, into permaculture activities. Good food is associated with not only *halal* food, but is also food that meets the principle of *thayib* (does not engage in any actions that is socially and environmentally destructive, and sinful in the context of religious practice). The so-called Islamic ecology inspires these movements to be part of justice to nature and to the environment (Deviane, 2019). Bumi Langit counters the Western doctrines of "freedom" that advocate for individual choices because they suggest that in reality, "things do not become better". They claim that the doctrine of freedom puts aside the nature rules that govern all mankind, letting greed takes over and violates nature's law. Islam, on the other hand, gives rules that align with nature and governs the way human must act (Putro & Miyaura, 2020). Islamic teachings on Muslims' daily lives, holistic sustainable practices, and scientifc approach and claims on benefts of sustainable practices to human's nutrition intake.

Jiwa Damai, meanwhile, focuses on the alignment of self-acceptance with natural metabolism of the earth. The re-identifcation of the self, furthermore, is a central process in balancing all the elements of human presence in their very broad cosmological space through self-healing, inner peace, self-love, and care for the Earth (Rueffer, 2014).

IDEP Foundation knowledge claims embrace the idea of humanity, respecting all forms of life (IDEP Foundation, 2021a, b, c). Knowledge project is dedicated toward building community self-suffciency and resilience in facing the risk of future crisis and disaster. Growing consciousness on the internal crises has contributed to shaping the practical method these communities introduce to their audience. IDEP Foundation engages explicitly with the dominant global development discourse, mainly the sustainable development goals (SDGs) promoted by the United Nations (Putro & Miyaura, 2020). In making their knowledge authoritative and legitimate, therefore, productive engagement with various articulations of environmental discourses is also witnessed as a co-constituting process. The organization makes an explicit reference to Code of Conduct established by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement and Non-Governmental Humanitarian Organization (IDEP Code of Conduct, n.d). The Program Implementation Manual of the organization also states a reference to Hyogo Framework for Action (HFA) and Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (SFDRR) (IDEP Foundation, 2021a, b, c). Multiple scales of knowledge references have played an important role in shaping the knowledge claims of these permaculture movements and later defne their scope of knowledge engagement as they pursue particular and collective goals. In such context and with refection to the experience of societies in other parts of the world, the question of knowledge institutionalization among the elements of environmental movements begs a thorough consideration. For some, institutionalization agenda often results in the state's cooptation and neutralization of a progressive agenda (Meek, 2015). The term institutionalization perhaps demands a re-articulation that it may accommodate the plea of collective agenda brought by counter-hegemonic forces through the so-called "war of position" (Gramsci, 1971), a projection of the long-term alliance building and ideological reform. Navigating through the institutional and mobilization aspects of knowledge co-production, therefore, shapes the political nuance of transformative projects brought about by permaculture movements in Indonesia.

### *12.2.4 Communities of Praxis*

The individual and collective dimensions of knowledge system across permaculture communities are translated into various methods in managing the land-human relations as a system of life. Collective strategies have developed to stand distinctively from knowledge practices associated with agro-industrial methods. For the participants of the movements, permaculture is known as a terminology that can serve this purpose by delineating the traditional agricultural methods from those associated with the industrial. Such terminology is articulated in the development of organic farming method, the use of non-industrial fertilizers and substances, and the circular maintenance of local life materials. Other term that is also familiar among these communities is biological gardening, which is understood as a strategy to incorporate knowledge on microorganism for crop planting that will provide vegetables, fruits, and medicinal herbs. Such practice is also complemented by the minimum use of new materials and reliance on recycled and refurbished materials to develop house construction and farms. Water and energy supply is provided through maximizing the natural cycle of annual rainfall and the use of solar panel and biogas for cooking. Efforts to minimize negative impacts of material use are also present in the form of waste separation, composting and reducing plastic consumption. The urban context, in which land availability is limited, permaculture techniques also adjust with maximizing the function of space.

Collective action is imbued with community-based values and social solidarity. The ecological sense of collectivity shapes the way the participants of the movement identify the implications of their agricultural practices. Collective practices are also informed by the materialization of permaculture in their very particular meaning for these different movements.

Jiwa Damai encourages vegan lifestyle as counter-practices to meet-based consumption, which they considered to increase pressure on land use and is not sustainable in the long term. Most of the activities conducted in these communities involve informal and interpersonal relations that allow participants to interact fuidly across diverse socio-cultural background and social status.