- Doni Prabowo, Ahmad Maryudi, Senawi, Muhammad A. Imron. 2017. Conversion of forests into oil palm plantation in West Kalimantan, Indonesia: Insight from actors’ and its dynamics. Forest Policy and Economics 78: 32-39. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.forpol.2017.01.004 .
Abstract
Oil palm plantations have been touted as one of the main drivers of deforestation in Indonesia. This paper aims to explain how oil palm companies accumulate power that enables them to control forestland and convert it into oil palm. Specifically, this paper identifies empirical evidence pointing to why oil palm companies emerge as powerful actors in land use conflicts. This paper uses the case of forest lands claimed by different actors – i.e. a timber plantation company, an oil palm company, and local communities – in West Kalimantan, Indonesia. Before the decentralisation policy, the interests of timber plantations were principally safeguarded by coercion from the forest ministry. The timber company was also supported by local communities by promising financial incentives to them. Following the decentralisation policy, additional actors get involved in the land use conflicts leading to more complex power interplays. In fact, some forestlands licensed for timber plantations are used by the oil palm company. Oil palm interests resonate with the economic interests of local governments, who use their legal mandates on land use allocation to facilitate the establishment of oil palm. The power of the oil palm company is also enhanced by the support from local communities, to which it handed more financial incentives than those of the timber plantation. It also used dominant information of customary claims and land appropriation by the ministry of forestry, with which it persuades local communities to pressurize government institutions to support oil palm operations.
- Ahmad Maryudi, Muhammad A.K. Sahide. 2017. Research trend: Power analyses in polycentric and multi-level forest governance. Forest Policy and Economics 81 (C): 65-68. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.forpol.2017.05.003 .
Abstract
Forest policy analyses have increasingly employed political, sociological and jurisprudence theories to explain the fundamental social and political outcomes of particular forest policies and programs. A new strand of forest policy analysis even contributes to the creation of new theories and frameworks. One of the novel advances of this discipline is the theoretical framework of Actor-Centred Power (ACP) that is dedicated for power analyses. We comment on the recent scholarship employing the framework and propose future research directions. We identify potential gaps for the use of the theoretical framework for analysing power relationships in polycentric and multi-level forest governance. They include key questions for the theory, methods, and empirical research that warrant for close observation in the future.
- Dodik Ridho Nurrochmat, Ignatius Adi Nugroho, Hardjanto, Agus Purwadianto, Ahmad Maryudi, James Thomas Erbaugh. 2017. Shifting contestation into cooperation: Strategy to incorporate different interest of actors in medicinal plants in Meru Betiri National Park, Indonesia. Forest Policy and Economics 83: 162-168. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.forpol.2017.08.005 .
Abstract
Meru Betiri National Park (MBNP) is home to a variety of medicinal plantsthat local communities collect for individual use and sale. In MBNP, a variety of actors are interested in medicinal plants for different reasons. This paper analyzes the interest and influence of ten important actors related to medicinal plant collection and use in MBNP: national park management, the Plantation and Forestry Office of Jember District, farmer groups (jaket resi), medicinal plant collectors (pendarung), medicinal plants purchasers (pengepul), small-scale medicinal plant industries of the Toga Sumber Waras, Bandealitplantation company, a conservation NGO (LSM KAIL), loggers (blandong), and log buyers (borek kayu). To examine and map the position of different interests and influences of actors involved in medicinal plant usage, this paper uses a power grid matrix. The analysis confirms that five of the ten aforementioned actors play a direct role in the medicinal plant policy process, while five actors do not and can be categorized as context setters, subjects, or crowd. This paper ends by recommending a strategy for considering policy options that promote shared interests and minimize anticipated objection from actors concerning the harvest of medicinal plants in MBNP. It concludes that the utilization of medicinal plants in MBNP, together with protection of natural resources, should become an integral part of the park’s conservation strategy.
- Rodd Myers, Dian Intarini, Martua Thomas Sirait, Ahmad Maryudi. 2017. Claiming the forest: Inclusions and exclusions under Indonesia’s new’ forest policies on customary forests. Land Use Policy 66: 2015-213. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2017.04.039 .
Abstract
The hopes of customary communities in Indonesia have recently been bolstered by Constitutional Court assurances that they have the right to control customary forest. There are, however, several obstacles to making successful claims, and there are also many situations in which forest users and customary land claimants do not stand to benefit from the recent rulings. This policy review analyses the court decisions, politics around their implementation, and considerations of types of land claimants who are excluded from the current process. We highlight groups of forest and ex forestland users that are excluded from benefiting from the Constitutional Court decisions and are adversely affected by land use change and re-designation of land. These groups include those with claims over land in conservation areas, allocated to concessionaires for resource extraction, on land already issued to them through forest management rights, and those whose land has already been removed from the State forest land.
- Micah Fisher, Ahmad Maryudi, Muhammad Alif K Sahide. 2017. Forest and society: initiating a southeast asia journal for theoretical, empirical, and regional scholarship. Forest and Society 1(1): 1-7. http://dx.doi.org/10.24259/fs.v1i1.1369 .
Abstract
Welcome to our first edition. We are excited to provide a new, and what we believe, timely avenue for presenting research findings and publications in Southeast Asia, for scholars interested in Southeast Asia. Although Southeast Asia as a region of study has provided tremendous contributions to theory and practice regarding forests and society across the social and natural sciences, avenues for cultivating a scholarship of the region remain limited. We seek to engage on a broad set of themes through the application of targeted research related to timely issues affecting the human-environment interface in a diverse region that we have much to learn from. We take a broad understanding of the forest – as a politico-administrative unit, a geographic area, and as an ecological unit. We do not limit the forest to its boundaries but rather seek to engage on the dynamics of change in social and ecological processes. Under such an umbrella, new approaches and methods become possible. ‘Forest’ can be analyzed as land use, ecological process, divided across watersheds, as landscapes, mountains, and more. The lens of ‘society’ allows for opportunities to understand change, whether it is the interaction between a resource to be preserved, exploited, forgotten, or erased. Forests, therefore, operate as the clues of what once was, has become, and what can be. Particularly in the age of climate change, riddled by increasingly complex challenges, a new dimension also emerges for the forest. Different perspectives at different scales – from the local to the global – provide equally important dimensions, and are those which we seek to provide avenues to learn from, and communicate through this journal. As the reader will find in this inaugural issue, we have compiled an initial set of studies across multiple methods and geographies that help to set the terms of future editions. We examine: historical political ecologies of land use around opium cultivation in the uplands of Thailand; emerging governance regimes of corporate social responsibility in Myanmar; the capacity of new state institutions to manage land conflict in forest estate lands in Indonesia; a close analysis of forest harvesting and management in a mangrove forest in Malaysia; and, an economic valuation of non-timber forest products in a national park in Indonesia. There is much to choose from and much more to delve into. We hope that this issue serves as an impetus to engage on these timely themes and further encourages new ideas for submissions.
- Ahmad Maryudi, Ani A Nawir, Dewi A Sekartaji, Purnomo Sumardamto, Ris H Purwanto, Ronggo Sadono, Priyono Suryanto, Emma Soraya, Djoko Soeprijadi, Agus Affianto, Rohman Rohman, Slamet Riyanto. 2017. Smallholder farmers’ knowledge of regulations governing the sale of timber and supply chains in Gunungkidul District, Indonesia. Small-scale forestry 16(1): 119-131. DOI 10.1007/s11842-016-9346-x .
Abstract
Smallholder timber plantations may offer opportunities for farmers to increase their income. Nonetheless, such opportunities are often lost largely due to unfavorable regulations imposed on harvesting and marketing of timber. Adverse impacts are worsened because the regulations are not effectively communicated to smallholder farmers. We assessed the level of smallholder knowledge of existing regulations and found it very low. In part, this correlated to their socio-demographic characteristics. Poor literacy skills and a low level of education make it difficult for older farmers’ to increase their knowledge. This is compounded by the limited information channels that can reach the farmers. Improving smallholders’ knowledge by providing information concerning markets and regulations in a timely and clear manner could help smallholders exercise coping strategies and priorities when selling their timber that would in turn reduce the negative impacts of regulations. The roles of village authorities could be crucial. They are close to the smallholders and could channel the information. The government could provide training and incentives for them to be more active in communicating the regulations to the smallholders.
- Eko N Setiawan, Ahmad Maryudi, Ris H Purwanto, Gabriel Lele. 2017. Konflik tata ruang kehutanan dengan tata ruang wilayah (studi kasus penggunaan Kawasan hutan tidak prosedural untuk perkebunan sawit Provinsi Kalimantan Tengah). BHUMI: Jurnal Agraria dan Pertanahan 3(1): 51-56.
Abstract
No. 26 Year 2007 on Spatial Planning (UUPR) mandated that all levels of government administration, ranging from the national, provincial, district/ city are obligated to prepare Spatial Plan (RTR). Until 2012, Central Kalimantan is one of the provinces which have not completed its spatial plan; one of the reasons was the lack of spatial integration of Forestry Spatial Planning and Provincial Spatial Planning of Central Kalimantan. The absence of spatial integration of forestry and provincial spatial planning of Central Kalimantan has the implication in triggering conflicts of land use. Forest areas were converted into oil palm plantations without any official procedures. There are 282 units of oil palm companies, occupying 3.9 millions hectares of forest area, with non-procedural procedures to convert forest area into oil palm plantation. To resolve this problem, the Government has revised the regulation of forest conversion by issuing PP No. 60/2012, provides opportunities for oil palm plantations, which under the Law of Forestry located in forest area but based on RTRWP of Central Kalimantan lies on APL or cultivation area, given the opportunity to re-apply the permit/license.