Decentralization of Forest Administration in Indonesia, Implications ...

Moira Moeliono and Ahmad Dermawan 113
the wish for individual rights (Fay and Sirait 2002). Protection of rights has also been
difficult because outsiders are sometimes not aware and do not necessarily recognize
local adat claims.
6.4 Changing Local Understandings of Territory and
Boundaries
While adat territories often directly coincide with village territories, this is not always the
case. In fact, neither kind of territory has been systematically delineated in the field in
most of Indonesia. Further confusion is added through the ad hoc manner of government
land zonation initiatives, whereby the Ministry of Forestry has acted independently of
the National Land Bureau. For example, when the Department of Forestry delineated
the permanent Forest Estate (Kawasan Hutan) in the early 1970s, nearly 95 percent of
Malinau (East Kalimantan) was designated state forest land and no space was given to
existing communities (Anau et al. 2001). It is, therefore, unclear whether forests are
legally within village territories or villages are within the forest area. Adat movements,
of course, claim that villages existed before the government’s designation of the Forest
Estate, therefore adat claims should have precedence. However, it is also true that in
the past most existing villages made territorial claims only on areas in actual use, which
usually includes secondary forest growing in areas after shifting cultivation.
In spite of the prevalence of ‘adat’ claims to land and forest resources in
practice local communities, district government agencies and even companies tend to
treat registered villages as the most common unit for local claims. In Malinau (East
Kalimantan), this conclusion is based on three pieces of evidence. First, when villagers
were asked in a mapping project facilitated by CIFOR what they wanted to map, they
unanimously responded that mapping their village boundaries was their highest priority.
Communities of the Upper Malinau region have mapped their boundaries based on
registered village territories. Second, timber compensation claims generally have been
based on village boundaries. Third, the district government has issued small-scale forest
conversion permits almost entirely to villages, and has referred to these villages in adat
terms, for example ‘tanah adat’ or ‘hutan adat’. Using existing village territories has
probably been the most expedient and most conflict-minimizing means of “allocating
adat rights” (Barr et al. 2001). In Baru Pelepat (Jambi) there is a movement to have a
hamlet now belonging to the neighbouring village of Rantel redefined as part of Baru
Pelepat in order to be united within one adat community (Indriatmoko and Kusumanto
2001).
The situation in Malinau is complicated because of a history of migration and
forced resettlement resulting in multiple villages and multiple ethnic groups being mixed
in one location. Recent newcomers did not always sever ties with their former territories.
With decentralization and the rise of small-scale logging, a new sense of the meaning
of boundaries has developed and a trend is occurring among villages to claim locations
where they had previously settled (CIFOR 2002). This new awareness of the meaning
of boundaries and extent of territories has arisen partly due to the many community
mapping projects all over Indonesia, but also due to the monetary value now given to
natural resources. The idea of boundaries itself has also changed. In the past, boundaries
were generally laid along natural features, mainly rivers or water divides. Boundaries