T

he government, through the Peatland Restoration Agency (BRG), has set an ambitious target to restore about 700,000 hectares of fire-prone peatland across the country in 2017 as part of the plan to have a total of 2 million ha restored by 2020.

Last year, the government intended to restore 600,000 ha of peatland, but only about 260,000 ha were cured.

The government initially only planned to restore 400,000 ha this year, but during a meeting on peatland restoration at the State Palace on Wednesday the Cabinet decided to include last year’s shortfall of 338,000 ha onto its 2017 to-do list.

In his opening remarks, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo reiterated the government’s commitment to restore and increase the wetness of a total of 2 million ha of peatland by 2020.

The government aims to prevent recurring forest fires in the country that were mainly caused by inflammable peatlands in seven smoke-producing provinces.

“Some 685,000 ha are in protected forest and on conservation land,” Jokowi said.

“Therefore, to reach the 2017 target, we need collective efforts between ministries and local administrations, as well as other relevant parties,” the President added.

Some 1.4 million of the targeted 2 million ha of peatland are located in concession areas in the provinces of Riau, Jambi, Papua, South Sumatra, West Kalimantan, South Kalimantan and Central Kalimantan.

Environment and Forestry Minister Siti Nurbaya Bakar said the government had built a total of 16,615 canals and 2,581 water containers known as embung and drilled 561 wells in the seven provinces.

Jokowi said that restoration of peatland in conservation areas must be done with a proper dissemination of information to educate local people about the importance of action to prevent fires.

He added that the government would firmly enforce the law on land burners in 2017.

“For the 6.1 million ha of peatland [that are outside concession areas], I have ordered a total protection of it by keeping in mind that there will be no more issuance of new permits other than permits for ecosystem restoration that is done with local people,” Jokowi said.

The BRG’s head Nazir Foead admitted that the agency’s achievements in 2016, its first year, were still far below target. He said the BRG spent most of its first year carrying out studies to support the restoration efforts.

“The 260,000 ha of peatland were restored collectively by companies, the UNDP [United Nations Development Program], the BRG and local administrations,” Nazir said.

He further said that the government had established an online monitoring system to keep tabs on the degree of peatland humidity in 20 areas in five provinces as a pilot project.

“The degree of peatland humidity could be monitored live from the BRG, the Environment and Forestry Ministry and the Presidential Office,” Nazir said.

He added that companies owning concession permits would be required to establish such monitoring systems on their concession lands.

Nazir said that 60 percent of expenses for the restoration efforts in 2017 would be funded by the state budget and the remaining 40 percent would be financed by donors.

The agency head acknowledged that some companies were still reluctant to participate in the restoration program because they were worried that the productivity of their land would decrease if the humidity of peatland was increased.

Wetter peatland tended to lower the production of any plants growing on it, he added.

Nazir said that Jokowi had signed a government regulation to require companies to establish a satellite system to help the government better monitor the degree of humidity in their peatland.

“With the issuance of the regulation, at least 15 percent of companies’ peatland could be monitored online,” Nazir said.