Decentralization of Forest Administration in Indonesia, Implications ...

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degraded, in order to maintain both the environmental services they supply and the
important contributions they make to local economies. Moreover, the central, provincial,
and district governments urgently need to find ways to coordinate more closely with
one another to determine how deforested and degraded lands currently within the Forest
Estate should be managed. Should these areas be reforested or otherwise rehabilitated,
and if so, by whom? Should local communities be given greater access to these lands, or
legal recognition for existing tenurial rights within the Forest Estate? If so, how?
As policymakers at each level consider how to strengthen the framework for forest
administration in Indonesia, they may wish to guide their actions by the following list of
priority objectives, based on findings reported in this book.
• There is a need to resolve outstanding contradictions that exist within the current
legal and regulatory framework for forest administration, particularly between
Indonesia’s laws and regulations on regional governance and those for specific
sectors, including the forestry sector.
• Government agencies at all levels need to develop more “whole of government”
approaches. This will require greater degrees of consultation, coordination, and
negotiation both between levels of government and among government agencies
within any one level.
• In the forestry sector, in particular, it will be essential for stakeholders to shift away
from competing for remaining economic rents associated with dwindling forest
resources, and to focus instead on how responsibility for managing degraded forest
landscapes should be shared.
• There is a need to strengthen institutional capacity at the district and provincial
levels, particularly in newly developed provinces and districts, as well as among the
forestry bureaucracies at each level.
• Decentralization requires increasing downward accountability of district and
provincial governments (both executive and DPRD) in order to reduce corruption
and elite capture of benefits associated with forestry activities.
• Greater transparency in forestry sector decision-making is needed to make
government policy processes more accountable to civil society and to increase
accountability among government agencies at different levels. It is especially critical
that the allocation and distribution of forest revenues at all levels of government be
carried out in a transparent and accountable manner.
It should be emphasized that none of these objectives will be easy to achieve.
However, each is critical for establishing an effective system of forest administration
within Indonesia’s current political and governance structure. If well implemented,
successful decentralization with support from Indonesia’s central government promises to
deliver more optimal outcomes in terms of forest sustainability, economic development,
and livelihood security for forest communities than has been achieved in the past.