Reducing peatland fires in Indonesian Borneo

In early August, the provincial governor of Central Kalimantan, located on the Indonesian part of Borneo Island, issued a decree that had the Asia Program folks at IRI jumping for joy. Ok, scientists at IRI aren’t really in the habit of jumping about their work. But they did get quite excited about the governor’s statement.

“The decree is a landmark document on at least two counts: it moves away from previous government approach that banned the use of fire by farmers to one of controlled burning, and, it specifically mentions the use of climate information beyond weather–both of which we advocated in our work,” says Shiv Someshwar, head of IRI’s Asia and Pacific program. “Our efforts have translated into changed policy.”

Indonesia has faced increasing pressure from other Southeast Asian countries to get its fire problem under control. In turn, it has put pressure on its provinces to act. As a result, the Central Kalimantan government banned farmers from using fires in 2006. But the strategy, sporadically enforced, imposed serious burdens on poor farming communities, who claim the ban significantly decreased their livelihoods.

Now that the ban has been lifted, tensions should ease. But challenges remain. The decree doesn’t give details on what “controlled burning” entails, which authority will monitor or oversee the burning and how exactly climate information will be incorporated into decision making. There are other issues as well, which I will get to shortly. But first, some background on the situation.

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