From 30 November – 1 December 2011 a workshop on Capacity Building in Community Empowerment Programmes took place at the Forestry Training Centre of Samarinda. This event was a collaboration of GIZ FORCLIME, the Forestry Training Centre of Samarinda and WWF West Kutai Programme. The objectives of this workshop were to identify the capacity building needs in the Community Empowerment Programmes at various levels (system and policy level, network, organisation and individual levels). The event was attended by approximately 35 people from government agencies, private companies, academics, NGOs, ad hoc forestry institutions and representatives of local communities.

Some focal issues discussed in this workshop were: (a) The need of deregulation or decentralization of licensing for the development of Village Forest (Hutan Desa) / Community Forest (Hutan Kemasyarakatan) considering that the current licensing bureaucracy is felt by the community to be too long-winded and complicated; (b) the need to prepare a roadmap for the development of Village / Community Forest and to establish an Acceleration Working Group that involves national and regional stakeholders; (c) the need to establish an incentive system for regional governments and the communities to support the development of Village / Community Forest; (d) the need to establish an acceleration mechanism for the determination of both forest zone and village boundaries and to resolve tenurial conflicts; (e) the need to develop standardisation and synchronisation of data (including spatial data) between national and regional levels; (f) the need to develop a learning network for information sharing and capacity development, mainly for training; (g) modification of curricula for Village / Community forest training in accordance with the local context; (h) institutional strengthening of forestry extension services; (i) increasing the quality and quantity of forestry extension workers; (j) pushing for the allocation of budget in central and regional government to support the development of Village / Community Forest Programmes.

At the end of the workshop, participants agreed to reactivate the Discussion Forum on Community Based Forest Management (CBFM), which had been idle during the last 2 years. In the future, the CBFM Forum will be handled by the East Kalimantan Working Group on REDD+ and the Regional Forestry Council of East Kalimantan in collaboration with the Forestry Training Center of Samarinda. The first meeting is planned to be held in January 2012. The CBFM Forum will be directed to discuss in a step-wise manner various issues and solutions for problems related to capacity development in Village / Community Forest Programmes as identified in the workshop.

For more detail, please contact:
Edy Marbyanto
Senior Advisor for Sustainable Forest Management
E: edy.marbyanto@giz.de

Created: 22 December 2011

On 15 December 2011 the FORCLIME photo exhibiton was successfully launched in the entrance hall of the Ministry of Forestry. The exhibition was opened by Secretary General, Dr. Hadi Daryanto, on behalf of the Minister of Forestry, Zulkifli Hasan, SE., MM. The event was also the occasion for the award ceremony for the winners of the FORCLIME Online Photo Contest 2011. Among the distinguished guests was the Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany in Indonesia who witnessed the event and handed over the prizes for the winners of the online voting.

Prizes were awarded for the twelve winning photos, six each in the categories “A day in the forest” and “Forests and People”. All winning photos as well as the runners-up are displayed at the FORCLIME Photo Exhibition, from December 15th until December 23rd at the Ministry of Forestry of Indonesia, Lobby Block 1, Manggala Wanabakti, Jl. Jend. Gatot Subroto, Jakarta. The exhibition will be open for the public daily from 8 am to 5pm.
The Indonesian Ministry of Forestry and FORCLIME collaboratively conducted FORCLIME’s Online Photo Contest as part of the International Year of Forests 2011 celebrations in Indonesia.

Created: 19 December 2011

On 2 December 2011 the Ministry of Forestry supported by FORCLIME hosted an event to launch the book “Forest Management Unit (FMU) Development – Concept, Legislation and Implementation” attended by over 120 participants from the Ministry itself, other government agencies, foreign embassies, universities, non-government organizations, international development cooperation partners and the private sector. The slogan for this book launch - improving forest governance in Indonesia through FMU development - was truly reflected both in the opening speeches and in the presentations which followed about the FMU concept and early implementation experiences. As part of the launching ceremony the Secretary General on behalf of the Minister handed over a copy of the book each to all of the Directors General or their representatives. Once FMUs have been set up in all forest areas in Indonesia, all government programmes for forest development will be carried out within the FMU areas. The target of the Ministry of Forestry as stated in its medium term strategic plan (RENSTRA 2010-2014) is to have determined the area of 600 FMUs and to have 120 FMUs in operation by 2014.

The following documents are available from the FORCLIME office in Bahasa Indonesia and in English:

• “Forest Management Unit (FMU) Development – Concept, Legislation and Implementation”
• “Forest Management Unit (FMU) Development – Concept, Legislation and Implementation” (Summary)
• Legislation related to FMU development

Created: 12 December 2011