Noer Fauzi
Introduction
I am reporting my summer activities here not as a neutral and detached observer, but as an engaged actor in the process of creating, developing and enforcing the rural social movements that will be discussed in this PRESENTATION. The brief report will concentrate on some workshops held by KARSA, a Jogjakarta-based NGO that I co-founded in 2002 that works to support rural and agrarian reform initiatives in various areas in Indonesia. KARSA has also started a formal 5-year cooperation with the Institute of International Studies at UC Berkeley through Green Governance Program. Under this program KARSA is responsible for selecting and sending visiting scholars to Berkeley, managing research and workshops/trainings, and delivering some research-based papers and other related documents. This project is in concert with KARSA’s overall mission to support learning circles at various levels (local, regional and national), and to develop information networks between scholar-activists and concerned scholars on rural and agrarian reform. Through this program, KARSA has organized workshops on forestry land reform in which participants compare cases of peasant’s initiatives to push forestry land reform, mainly through land occupation tactics.
Massif land occupation began after the decline of Indonesia’s 32 years authoritarian regime and has become a fundamental tactic of local rural movements in Java In some areas they have been able to make revolutionary changes in local agrarian structure, land use, and modes of production, transforming areas from plantations to small landholdings, and agroforest. More than that, there are some development that these local movements have able to change accumulation structures and local political arenas at village and district levels.
SHOW THE PICTURE
This is a very distinct political-economic phenomenon, in contrast with a trend toward economic neoliberalization at the national level, and can be read as a promotion of human rights. When state institutions fail to address chronic agrarian problems, rural social movements have reminded the state of its obligation and showed the way to implement land reform.
The KARSA workshops have tried to create space for peasants’ testimonies and demands to access land and other related resources controlled by Perum Perhutani, the state forest company (SFC). The SFC (state forest company) is a para-state forest company, controlling around 19% of Java’s land, equivalent to 2.9 million hectares. This is really a biggest landlord in Java.
Through these workshops, KARSA has tried to promote forestry land reform, by strengthening villagers’ access to land that have been controlled by PP. These workshops actually provide space for villagers to amplify their voices, which are rooted in their collective actions. More than that, the workshops have tried to find various policy windows that can be used as channels to empower village collective action.
KARSA is leading two kinds of workshops, local and national. KARSA is working with local leaders of Serikat Petani Pasundan (SPP), Persatuan Petani Mandiri (PPM) and Serikat Tani Independent (SEKTI) to organize the local workshops. To each workshop, KARSA invited village-level leaders of peasant unions that have had experience struggling for their rights against the SFC domination. KARSA conducted the national workshop in Jakarta, capital city of Indonesia; it was attended by staff and high-level officials of SFCs, and also high-level officials from the Ministry of Forestry and National Land Agency.
TALK through THE PICTURE
The Local Workshops
The overarching topic of the local workshops was the historical and sociological bases for land forestry reform agendas in lands controlled by the SFC. KARSA encouraged the workshop participants to give a testimony about their current access to the land, the process required to access land previously controlled by the SFC, and repression that they felt from the SFC or SFC’s allied parties. They were also encouraged to explore and discuss opportunities and strategies to achieve tenure security on cultivated lands. The local workshops also gave us concrete and practical examples of how rural movement groups have resisted a new SFC national program, i.e. Community Collaborative Forest Management (CCFM). The believes that the program will increase the quality of forest resources, forest productivity and forest security, and it plans to use adjustable forest resource management to suit the social dynamics of local communities around the forest.[1]
KARSA worked with SPP on the first local workshop. SPP is the biggest local peasant organization in Java, established in 1999. They organized more than 60 local peasant groups that have conflicts with big plantations and state forest institutions. The organization is one successful example of how a local movement is able to access the land previously controlled by the SFC. Their main tactic is land occupation, followed by joining SPP to conduct serious advocacy work in and outside the village.
For two days activities, on 12 and 13 March, we used permanent and semi-open buildings at SPP’s local chapter in Margaharja Village, Ciamis district. There are signs that clearly advertise the peasant organization (billboard, flags, banners, posters, etc.). The buildings were located in a land occupation area, near the main road to PP’s forest. Around 30 participants (around 30% are women) come from 12 local chapters of SPP in Tasikmalaya and Ciamis districts. They mostly used public transportation to get to the meeting place, and some of them used their motorcycles. The workshop was opened by the head of SPP’s local chapter, and then officially opened by the Deputy of General Secretary of SPP. I had helped them to structure and then to facilitate the session with the Deputy.
We had 12 cases of land occupation; we requested each case to make a brief presentation of several main points: sketch-maps of the disputed area, current condition of land tenure, land use and production system, historical sketch of land control, dynamic process of occupation and counter-movement, claims made by occupants and counter-claims from the SFC, and the process to and prospect of legal occupation. In most of the cases the SPP local movement tends to have negative attitude toward the SFC. Their general opinion is that the SFC’s Collaborative Forest Management is perceived as a new form of counter-movement against their collective initiative to access the land through land occupation and then improve the ecosystem and their livelihood through agro-forestry. They were frustrated, angry and resistant to the various forms of PP’s control over access to land, control over species, control over forest labor and ideological control. They did not buy the arguments that the collaborative management will improve rural livelihood and reforest the land.
The second local workshop was held at Pesantren (an Islamic boarding school) in Jember city, Jember district, East Java province, on 25–26 June 2006. KARSA worked with SEKTI, which had six cases of land occupation. NGO activists supporting SEKTI had facilitated the workshop. SEKTI was founded in 2004 and began working with 24 peasant groups that mostly had land-related problems with big private or state owned plantations in Jember district. They have been assisted by a group of NGO activists. Unlike local peasant groups that have a long history of struggle against the big plantations, SEKTI just started this year to recruit and organize forest-dependent peasant groups. So they used this workshop as starting point for understanding the problems, and then developed strategy and tactics relevant to the unique characteristics of tensions between peasant groups and the SFC.
Like the workshop with SPP, the facilitator tried to pose some questions to the participants, who had small group discussions and prepared presentations. They used sketch-maps to describe where villagers are able to access SFC land. In the SPP workshop, I felt there was solidarity between the peasants victimized by the SFC and enthusiasm to support each other, as well as critical consciousness against structural domination. But, in the SEKTI workshop, I felt a different climate emanating from the participants. They seemed to be disconnected and weak, while the NGOs serviced and supported them to strengthen their weak position vis-à-vis the powerful SFC. Unlike the SPP groups, SEKTI’s local peasant groups generally welcomed the SFC’s Collaborative program. The participants of this workshop did not challenge the SFC’s powers as SPP did. There are some NGO activists who problematizing the method of recruitment in the The SFC’s Collaborative Program, the composition of stakeholders at the village level, the fee for replanting and also the percentage of profit sharing. There was one peasant leader that really felt comfortable with the Collaborative scheme, because he already had benefited from it. So he encouraged the other groups to adopt the SFC proposal. But the NGO activists, including the facilitator of the workshop, hardly tried to criticize the man who promoted it.
In those two workshops with SPP and SEKTI, a KARSA resource person introduced a legal opportunity for peasant groups to challenge SFC’s right to have territorial control. The legal basis for this opportunity is a legal procedure to determine the status of local rights within the “Forest Zone,” through a detailed four-step process of the Forest Delineation Process Document.
KARSA’s resource person believes that there are opportunities to challenge existing SFC claims to control territory/lands. Because this delineation process should be participatory and based on consensual agreement, if there are communities that have land claims over the forest territory, they can refuse to include their land claims in the delineation process. But if the process is just and fair, with a clear explanation of the legal consequences, the area could be legally and legitimately declared a s State Forest Zone. At the end of the presentation, she recommended that the participants check the delineation processes that targeted the land that they have claimed. She believes that this is a good legal opportunity to challenge PP’s claims to the land and push the Ministry of Forestry to adopt land reform agendas.
At the end of the workshops, the facilitator let the SPP and SEKTI high-level leaders take over the concluding and plan of action sessions, and usually they used the previous workshop session as input for their organizational processes.
Visit to Paguyuban Petani Mandiri (PPM) in Wonosobo, Central Java
KARSA and the leaders of Paguyuban Petani Mandiri (PPM) Wonosobo changed the workshop format in Wonosobo, by visiting some cases of land occupation in SFC forest land organized by local peasant groups under Paguyuban Petani Mandiri (PPM) Wonosobo. Since its inception in 2002, PPM has been an umbrella organization of more than 20 local peasant groups in Wonosobo districts for whom conflict over forestry lands is their main issue. Wonosobo district is a unique case that concerns decentralizing forest management initiatives. Efforts of farmer groups, NGOs and district parliaments since 1999 culminated in the District Regulation No. 22/2001 on Community-based Forest Management (CBFM), passed by the Wonosobo Legislative Assembly in September 2001 and signed by the district head or bupati a month later. But, unfortunately the regulation was canceled by the Ministry of Forestry and Ministry of Home Affairs on 2003. [2]
We visited three areas in Wonosobo during our trip of 11–14 July 2006. The first area is a village in Dieng Mountain, a key area that the SFC always uses as an example of local people destroying the forest through illegal cutting and land occupation. There was one peasant leader that was just released from jail three months ago. He had been accused of being a wood thief, but he believed it was because he is a leader of the movement occupying more than 500 hectares of land previously controlled by the SFC. After he was arrested, membership in the movement declined from 500 members to only six. But now, after he reconsolidated the organization, it regained 60 members. With 60 members now, the organization has shown that they are able to start to reforest the area using agro-forestry style land use, in contrast with PP’s tree plantation style.
The second area is a 250 ha resettlement area. Almost 20 years ago the villagers were forcefully moved to this area, because their former settlement was a part of the “Wadas Lintang” Dam area. About a half of the villagers were moved to this area, and others were transmigrated to Sumatera island. The government decided to allocate about 600 ha as a greenbelt area controlled by the SFC. After the District Government declared district regulation on CBFM, some NGO activists came to the area to promote the idea that villagers have a right to cultivate the greenbelt previously controlled by the SFC. After that, villagers started to cut pines trees, use the logs and then cultivate the land. Working with police, the SFC conducted a repressive operation to try to force the villagers to use CCFM schemes, but the peasant group refused. Two villagers were jailed for six months. Villagers responded to the repression with protests inside and outside the village. The result was that almost all the pines were cut, except for a few trees they found on very sloppy land. The SFC withdrew from the area in 2001, and until now there has been no response from the SFC. The PPMleaders perceive that the area is not profitable anymore and it has not be targeted for reforestation projects. We visited the area that was cultivated by the villagers and found an embryo of a agro-forestry complex where peasants cultivate the land with cash crops along with fruit and wood trees.
The third site that we visited is the most important site for PPM. The PPM leader told us that the village is a very important base for PPM because the area has become a model of how a local peasant group can successfully occupy land previously controlled by PP and change the land use style to agro-forestry. They already produce cash crops to improve their livelihood and have been able to accumulate domestic capital at the family level. When we talked with the local leaders about factors that make them successful in the fight against the SFC, they shared with us details of various forms of oppression that PP’s staff and field officers used before the Soeharto authoritarian regime stepped down in 1998. When reformation began, they took revenge with various tactics to kill the pine trees. With guidance from PPM leaders, they have developed a solid organization based on their militant fight against PP and they have been able to push PP out of their area. When we visited the field, we saw some promising agro-forestry plots, and also some villagers that freely cut pine trees to use for cooking firewood. They said that each tree provided six months of firewood for one family.
National Workshop on Forest Governance
This workshop, held in Jakarta on 18–19 June 2007, provided a good understanding of competing strategies between the State Forest Company and its allies, government institutions and rural social movements groups supported by NGO activists. There was a presentation from a National Land Agency (NLA) high official describing the discrepancy between their de jure legal mandate and de facto sectoral and limited authority. Basic Agrarian Law (BAL) No. 5/1960 mandated them to handle all earth surfaces and the resources in it. But actual NLA authority is outside of forest territory and mining concessions, only 23% of the total area of Indonesia. The NLA only can redistribute state forest land if the Ministry of Forestry decides to exclude it from the state forest zone. On the other hand, if there is no official decision from the Minister of Forestry, there is nothing that they can do.
A presentation from the SFC director was really helpful to understand new targets of the SFC after their near-bankruptcy in 1997-1999 as consequence of mass illegal logging following the fall of Soeharto’s authoritarian regime. He showed that there was big shift in management of the SFC from a “feudal” system into a modern company, not only at lower levels, but more importantly, at higher levels of management. Significant cases of corruption pushed the SFC to be a more efficient, accountable and transparent business organization. The poverty of forest-dependent communities also stimulated the SFC to take a bigger responsibility in the changing character of the international timber market, in its changing relationship with local communities, and to create a new approach toward combining timber and non-timber products of the SFC. The Community Collaborative Forest Management (CCFM) is one of PP’s new key programs. The presenter tried to use statistics and projections to convince the audience that it would not only solve chronic problems mentioned, but also to bring a bright future to the SFC.
The other important presentation was made by an officer from the Planning Board in the Ministry of Forestry. He shared two preconditions should be understood. First, the Ministry of Forestry has been working under Basic Forestry Law no. 41/99, which means implicitly that they do not work under Basic Agrarian Law no. 5/1960. Second, unlike other departments, the Ministry of Forestry has territorial authority in the Forest Zone. The condition of the forest is not relevant; whether there is a forest ecosystem or not, as long as it is included in the Forest Zone, the Ministry of Forestry has an authority to control and manage the area. So, in this context, the main roles of the Planning Board are macro-planning and delineation of the Forest Zone. In order to create a definite Forest Zone, the Planning Board must clearly delineate area and after that determine the forest function for the area. In SFC areas, the Planning Board has authority to decide whether an area will be designated production forest or protected forest.
Those three very important presentations at the workshop led us to conclude that forestry land reform is not on the agenda of policy makers of the SFC and government bodies. Given this situation, workshop participants had a serious debate about whether the community should accept or refuse the Collaborative Program. Participants were split into two camps; some community leaders working with NGOs opposed to the collaborative program allied with the majority of the participants, while other community leaders and SFC staff worked closely with supporters of CCFM. The two camps shared their arguments, but there was no shifting in positions by the end of workshop. Unfortunately, for technical reasons, participants from the pro-CCFM camp left the arena before the workshop ended and then participants from the anti-CCFM camp continued the workshop to make recommendations for KARSA’s future agenda.
Closing Statement
How should we read land occupation as exemplified by some local movements in Java? The introduction of this report clearly indicates that the workshops amplify the lesson “while policy makers dither, social movements can show the way”. We also find that collective land occupations in the field are always defended in public discourse using language of “rights.”
To close this presentation, I remember points that made by a prominent critical legal studies scholar, Alan Hunt. In his view:
"Rights take shape and are constituted by and through struggle. Thus, they have the capacity to be elements of emancipation, but they are neither a perfect nor exclusive vehicle for emancipation. Rights can only be operative as constituents of a strategy of social transformation as they become part of an emergent “common sense” and are articulated within social practices. Rights-in-action involve an articulation and mobilization of forms of collective identities. This does not imply that they need to take the form of “collective rights”, but simply that they play a part in constituting the social actors, whether individual or collective, whose identity is changed by and through the mobilization of some particular rights discourse. They articulate a vision of entitlements, of how things might be, which in turn has the capacity to advance political aspiration and action" (Hunt 1990:325-326).
The movements have provided some successful example how the rights-in-action able to improve the villager’s access to land that previously controlled by the SFC. It will be my future project to understand how The SFC as a biggest state landlord in Java has changed their strategy and practices to deal with the relative success of agrarian movements.
Berkeley, Nov 1st, 2007
[1] During 1999-2000, the SFC conducted a series of public consultations and discussions with several NGOs and academics to formulate a participatory model of Java forest management, to improve the welfare of local people, and to manage the forest sustainably. The resulting program, Pengelolaan Hutan Bersama Masyarakat or Community Collaborative Forest Management (CCFM), was implemented by the SFC in 2001 with the objectives: (1) to improve the sense of responsibility of the SFC, local people and other actors who have an interest in sustaining the forest; (2) to enhance the role of the SFC, local people and other actors who have an interest in the forest management system; (3) to harmonize all forest management activities and regional development that affects the social dynamic in the nearby village; (4) to enhance the quality of forest resources that coincide with specific problems in the site; and (5) to simultaneously improve the earnings of the SFC, villagers and other interested actors. (SFC’s Regulation No. 136/Kpts/DIR/2001 as quoted by Awang, et al. 2006).
[2] Both Ministries of Forestry and Home Affairs sought the revocation of CBFM through extra-judicial procedures. The Forestry Minister issued a letter to the Home Affairs Minister requesting cancellation, using the basis that the SFC has prior rights over the state forest lands concerned and thus the regulation contradicts 1999 Forestry Law. One month later, the General Secretary of Home Affairs issued a letter to the Wonosobo District Head asking for the policy revocation. The apprehension of Home Affairs is said to be coming from an interpretation that CBFM gives Wonosobo District the power to alter the status of forest lands. On top of this, Perhutani submitted a petition for judicial review to the Supreme Court. For fuller account of the “Wonosobo Case”, see Adi, et al. 2005.
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