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Money isn't everything: Ex-illegal loggers regret cutting down trees
Deaths and accidents have triggered changes of heart among illegal loggers in Jember and Banyuwangi, East Java, who are now working hard to protect forests.
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Forty-year-old farmer Sutinggal works to clean wild weed at the Meru Betiri National Park in Sanenrejo village, Jember regency, East Java, on Feb. 15. After working as an illegal logger for around 20 years, Sutinggal changed course by becoming a farmer and committing to protect the forest against further destruction. (JP/Kharishar Kahfi)
O
ne day in June 2006 became a turning point in the life of Suhartono, now 42, a resident of Sanenrejo village in Temporejo district, Jember regency, East Java. Back then, he made a living by cutting down trees illegally in the protected Meru Betiri National Park.
On that particular day, after he had cut down a 20-meter glintungan (bishop wood tree), the log rolled down and fell onto his feet, causing him to drop a running chainsaw he was holding to cut the log.
“The chainsaw fell onto my left calf, tearing the muscle. I was immediately carried by eight other loggers for 2 kilometers out of the forest. Luckily, I received treatment at the Jember Regional General Hospital,” Suhartono told The Jakarta Post in early February.
“On that same day, I uttered my intention to stop stealing trees from the forest,” he went on to say.
Today, Suhartono leads a group of dozens of former illegal loggers in the village who call themselves mantan berandal alas (former forest robbers). They worked with local authorities on alternative sources of income, such as cultivating crops and producing batako (concrete bricks).
The alternative sources of income allowed them to leave their old lives behind, since they were prohibited by the authorities from cutting down trees in the forest. Some were even asked to plant new trees in an attempt to restore the degraded forest.
The government declared the 50,000-hectare Meru Betiri forest, which lies in the East Java regencies of Jember and Banyuwangi, a conservation area in 1972. In 2016, the Environment and Forestry Ministry revised the total area of the national park to 52,626 ha.
