Jakarta, - The carbon trading scheme through Social Forestry (PS), should be able to open the eyes of the Government of the Republic of Indonesia, because there are already those who prove it works and the results are felt directly by the communities around the forest area.

This was revealed in a discussion with various NGO representatives at the Stakeholder Strategic Meeting: Strengthening Social Forestry Contributions to Support the Achievement of Indonesia's NDC Targets, at Century Park Hotel Jakarta, Tuesday (4/23/2019).

"If there is no Warsi and FFI (Flora and International Fauna), the Government does not see this as something visible in the financing of community base. We are actually proof cases. For example, if you want to take it from PS, based on our study, you get 2 tons of CO2e per hectare. Now, if we have 12.7 million hectares, we can calculate how much we get, "said Joseph Adiguna Hutabarat from FFI, during the discussion.

Yoseph and his colleagues at FFI have proven carbon trading schemes for social forest scales in Lombok, Jambi and Kalimantan with fund-based schemes, and market-based schemes in Jambi. In addition to FFI, Rudi from Warsi also admitted that his party had proven carbon trading in Bujang Reba, Bungo Regency, Jambi. The same thing was also recognized by Imanul Huda from the Indonesian PRCF who practiced carbon trading in Kalimantan.

From that acknowledgment, it is clear that the community base performance payment has been validated by the International. This means that institutions established at the site level, for example the Village Forest Management Institution (LPHD) can directly connect with outside donors to trade carbon through a Fund-based scheme without going through the Government.

Indeed, in the discussion it was also admitted that there was a gap in understanding in the carbon market, especially in the internal government itself. Therefore, the Government is expected to be able to open a discussion space to equate perceptions of carbon trading that are appropriate and acceptable to all parties.

Some village forest management agencies that have received tangible results from carbon trading, for example the Bujang Raba Community, which is coordinated by KKI WARSI, conserves endangered primary rainforests in the Evidence Barisan Sumatra forest through a REDD + intervention program. More than 5,339 ha of primary forest will be protected by participating communities, which results in net carbon benefits of around 40,000 tCO2 per year.

Then there is the Punan Long Adiu village community in protecting 17,000 ha of primary rainforest under threat from logging, mining and oil palm concessions. The Punan Adiu Community Area covers an area of ??more than 17,000 hectares in Malinau District, North Kalimantan.With the help of a local LP3M NGO and a national and international expert team, the Nugum Lunang Lelum Tano 'project (which means Sustainable Forests, Safe Earth in the Punan language) has designed a series of activities that will enable them to protect their forests effectively. (ab)