A general view about the production forest as the region that frequently occurs deforestation for the economic needs is true. However, production forest able to reduce carbon emissions like other forest.
It expressed by the Director of Forestry Business Development, The ministry of forestry, Auria Ibrahim in the discussion “The Role of Production Forests in Emissions Reduction” at Manggala Wanabakti Building, Jakarta (29/4).
Confirmed it, Director of Terestrial The Nature Conservancy (TNC) Program, Herlina Hartanto said, “Natural forest maintained for the purpose of production also actually capable of being contributed for emission reduction when logging is done properly, for example, by the application of the Reduce Impact Logging-Carbon/RIL-C.
Ari Wibowo middle researcher of the Ministry of Forestry underscored that potential of production forest to mitigate the climate change are believed to have enormous contribution. “The area of production forest and limited production forest in Indonesia which 56 million hectares from the results of the calculations are able to store carbon as 9,52 gigatons of carbon,” he said.
But, Irsyal Yasman Director of Forest Business and Management, NRDC (Natural Resources Development Center) disappointed that the forest production in Indonesia in general have not managed well. “Plus, forest production which includes 58 % of Indonesia’s vast forests don’t have any formula of its role and contribution in greenhouse gas emissions reduction, including in REDD+ program,” he added.
While the REDD+ program that initiated from cooperation between Indonesia and Norway to reduce 26 % carbon by the year 2020 needs to see the potential of production forest. REDD+ also need to invite everyone involved in the forestry sector, including the Ministry of forestry, plantation companies and local communities.
Relation to the program redd +, Auria suggest redd + can provide an incentive to those who are capable to implement the RIL-C in their activities. He said everyone should get incentives because they has made a great contribution to emission reductions.
The event also launched 8 books by TNC from the cooperation with the Indonesian Ministry of Forestry, Responsible Asia Forestry and Trade (RAFT), the Government of Australia, Association of Indonesian Community Forestry Entrepreneurs and several other partners. These books contain information about the utilization and management of production forests sustainably.
“The point of that books is technical instructions and information on how to manage production forest logging able to sustain life and contribute to carbon emissions reduction (RIL-C),” said Herlina.
Auria appreciates the book launch and said that the launch of the book can be an inspiration in policy making for the achievement of sustainable forest management.
Ril-C is a logging management technique to reduce and prevent damage. TNC ‘ve test RIL-C at ten hectares of land and it is claimed able to minimize the damage. Herlina added from the results of research, RIL-C is able to reduce forest damage up to 50% And prevent the release of carbon emissions until 30% compared with conventional logging.
Related to the implementation of RIL-C, TNC introduced the Monocable winch technique who claimed to be able to reduce the negative impact of forest logging with this technique plants will selectively logged without damaging other plants so, emissions will be reduced also the waste that is produced. “Besides, the company also doesn’t require much heavy instrument so can save the cost,” said Herlina. Januar Hakam.