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Indonesia: Oil palm plantations encroaching
on communities’ traditional land
The
environment in West Kalimantan
has changed radically over the past 25 years. Much
of the forest that supported communities’ livelihoods has been
cut down and the land allocated to companies that clear it to
make way for oil palm plantations. Even forest traditionally
set aside for future generations (hutan cadangan) is prey
to “forest conversion”, since the government regards land left
fallow under traditional cultivation systems as “neglected” or
“critical”.
Now,
indigenous people have lost their livelihoods and no longer have
a ready source of timber or fish, nor can grow their own rice,
vegetables and other crops any longer; they must buy food. So
the introduction of oil palm plantations has made local communities
poorer.
Plantations
also obscure the natural boundaries between the customary units
(kampong) leading to more conflicts between communities. Under
the so called “plasma” system –commonly used to refer to the area
cultivated by smallholders that supplies the “nucleus” processing
plant-, people may be allocated plots of oil palm on customary
land (adat) belonging to another community or even in another
sub-district. So people no longer have control over their customary
lands and this weakens the whole adat system.
When adat
land is incorporated into a oil palm plantation as part of the
main body of an estate, it would likely imply for the family to
become a wage slave on their traditional land.
Regional autonomy
has made matters worse, denounces Pak Cion Alexander, a peasant
farmer from Sanggau, West Kalimantan, who also has a law degree
and is a community activist in the organisation Gerakan Rakyat
Pemberdayaan Kampung (GRPK). The local authorities are keen to
bring oil palm plantations into their areas on the grounds that
they increase local revenues, create employment, provide roads
and make communities better off. There are now nearly 40 plantation
companies in Sanggau alone.
As Pak Cion
Alexander says: “It is true that Sanggau district assembly passed
a local regulation on village governance (Perda No 4/2002)
providing us with the chance to go back to our traditional system,
based on the kampong. For generations, adat formed the basis of
highly democratic, independent communities which had control over
the natural resources within their customary lands. Decisions
were taken by the whole community, not by an elite. The standardised
system of village governance introduced by Suharto's regime in
1979 changed all that. But we wanted our adat system to be acknowledged.
So we pressed for the new regulation as soon as regional autonomy
was introduced.”
But the problem
is that “companies misuse traditional governance systems. The
government is complicit in this because it sets up its own, officially
approved ‘adat’ organisations and appoints the leaders.
It is these people who the companies approach to sign away community
rights.”
“It is vitally
important that indigenous rights are recognised in national legislation
and are further strengthened through
local regulations. The right to free, prior and informed consent
is part of this, so we can choose to accept or refuse a plantation
on our land. We also need to map the extent of our customary lands,
so that companies cannot take it from us so easily. Plantations
in Parindu, Kembayan, Tayan Hulu, Tayan Holir and Kapuas should
return customary land to indigenous communities because the land
procurement procedures violated national and adat law.”
Article based
on information from: "From Singapore to West Kalimantan”,
Down to Earth No. 68, February 2006, http://dte.gn.apc.org/68oi3.htm
