Controlling Karhutla, Ministry Of Environment And Forestry Handed Over Seed Gardens In Dosan

Photo: Public Relations of the Ministry of Environment and Forestry

JAKARTA - The Ministry of Environment and Forestry (KLHK) represented by the Head of the Indragiri Rokan Watershed and Protected Forest Management Agency (BPDAS), Tri Esti Indrarwati, handed over the Village Nursery (KBD) to the leader of Dosan village, Siak, Riau.

The handover of KBD is an important part of forest and land fire control (Karhutla) on a site-based basis. Through KBD, community empowerment is carried out so that they have alternatives to obtain economic welfare. With this participation and collaborative work, it is hoped that forest and land fires prevention can be done permanently.

"The handover of the KBD is an effort from the Ministry of Environment and Forestry to empower communities around the forest, so that they can be more prosperous and the surrounding environment is maintained," Esti said at the handover ceremony, Wednesday (15/10/2020).

KBD is a simple nursery unit built by the UPT Ditjen PDASHL in the village in a self-managed manner. This is motivated by the high demand of the community for timber and multipurpose types of plants (MPTS) to be planted in critical, empty, abandoned, or non-productive lands in the village.

In 2020, the BPDASHL Indragiri Rokan work area is targeted to build 20 KBD units. KBD locations are spread across 20 villages / nagari / kampung in 6 districts, namely Siak, Kampar, Pelalawan, Inhu, Sijunjung, and Pasaman (West Sumatra) districts.

Each KBD unit prepares a minimum of 40,000 KBD seeds, so that the total for Wilker BPDASHL Inrok there are 800,000 KBD seedlings out of a total of 20 KBD units built. Each KBD receives a fund allocation of Rp. 100 million.

'' The types of seeds vary depending on community interests. In Dosan, the types of seeds are Jengkol, Petai, Cempedak, Pinang, Durian, Matoa with a total of 40 thousand stems. Here the KBD managers are all women environmental activists, '' said Esti.

Riau Governor Syamsuar also witnessed the handover of the KBD to the Dosan community group. On the same occasion the Dosan resort office and community empowerment were also inaugurated. It is hoped that site-based forest and land fire control can be a permanent solution to overcoming forest and land fires with collective and collaborative work, involving joint work between the central government, local government, the private sector and the community.

Resort Dosan is included in the Tasik Besar Serkap KPH, and has become a national pilot. The Ministry of Environment and Forestry has prepared around 12 priority KPHs in 7 forest and land fire-prone provinces in Indonesia.

`` Managing forest and land fires cannot be done alone, it must be done together. The community around the forest must be given an alternative life. When the people are prosperous, the forest will be preserved. The construction of the Dosan resort is a national pilot for site-based forest and land fire control, we are grateful for the support of all parties, '' said Syamsuar.

Meanwhile, the Head of Wana Lestari Women's KBD, Suci Handayani (41) said that the community empowerment program through KBD is very beneficial for the community. Moreover, all of its members are housewives totaling 26 people.

'' We express our gratitude for the attention of the President and the Minister of LHK. With this KBD program, especially during a pandemic, we have been greatly helped. We also hope that with KBD, people will no longer need to burn because there are alternative jobs available. Hopefully this program will continue, '' Suci said.