Jakarta, May 22, 2003 (Islam Online - IOL) - Indonesia is blessed with the greatest and most diverse
biological resources in the world, after Brazil. This natural wealth can be
sustainably utilized for the welfare of the population. Unfortunately enough,
however, the country has not been able to successfully use the enormous natural
wealth to improve the welfare of her people.
In 1996, before Indonesia was hit by the on-going economic
crisis, the number of people under the poverty line was 22.5 million (around
11.3 per cent of the total population). According to data from the National
Bureau of Statistics, Indonesia’s population under the poverty line increased
drastically to around 79.4 million people (about 39 per cent) in 1999. And up
to now, Indonesia has not yet recovered from the prolonged economic crisis
marked by a high inflation rate, the increasing number of jobless people, and
the devaluation of the country’s currency (Rupiah) against the US dollar in
particular.
Mega Center for Biodiversity
Biodiversity is a highly valuable asset, and has been the
lifeblood of Indonesia’s traditional multi-ethnic population. Biological
diversity, or biodiversity, is the term used to explain the variety,
variability and uniqueness of genes, species and ecosystems. With its enormous
wealth of biotic resources, Indonesia has a great potential to sustainably
utilize her biological resources to meet the basic needs of the population:
food, clothing, housing and medicine.
Indonesia is the largest archipelago in the world, located
between two oceans, the Pacific and the Indian, and bridging two continents,
Asia and Australia. It consists of more than 17,000 islands, including five
main islands - Java, Kalimantan (Borneo), Irian Jaya (Papua), Sumatera and
Sulawesi.
Scientists acknowledge Indonesia, which has a population of
around 220 million, as one of the world’s ‘mega centers’ of biodiversity for
her wide range of natural habitats, rich flora and fauna species.
About 17 per cent of all species in the world can be found
in Indonesia, although it forms only 1.3 per cent of the Earth’s land surface.
The country has around 515 mammal species, 122 species of butterflies, 600
species of reptiles, 1531 species of birds, 270 species of amphibians, and
28,000 flowering plants.
Prehistoric Indonesian Dragons
Do you remember Jurassic Park? Come to Indonesia and meet
the Komodo dragon (Varanus komodoensis). Komodo is one of the world’s rarest
and most primitive reptiles, with a prehistoric appearance. The Komodo dragon,
the world’s largest lizard, can grow to three meters long and weigh up to 60
kilograms, and is found in western Flores and the islands of Komodo, Padar and
Rinca, East Nusa tenggara, and eastern Indonesia.
The exact number of Komodo dragons is unknown, but estimates
range from 3,000 to 6,000. Since 1931 it has been classified as an endangered
species. The habitat of the endemic animal is decreasing due to lack of
protection and the increasing illegal logging activities.
Unsurpassed Plant Life
The rich flora of Indonesia includes many unique varieties
of tropical plant life in various forms. Rafflesia arnoldi, which is found only
in certain parts of Sumatera and Kalimantan, is the largest flower in the
world. In Irian Jaya, 2500 different orchids are known; among them is the
world’s largest orchid, Grammatophyllum papuanus, with three-meter sprays of
orange blossoms.
About 6,000 species of plants are known to be used directly
or indirectly by the people. The use of plants in the production of traditional
herbal medicine or “Jamu” is very common.
As the largest tropical forest in the world, Indonesia has
species-rich forests that harbor the world’s greatest diversity of palms; more
than 400 species or 70 per cent of the world’s dipterocarp species (the most
valuable timer species in Southeast Asia) including ebony, teakwood, and
sandalwood; and 122 species of bamboo. The country also has over 350 species of
rattan and produces three-quarters of the world’s rattan cane.
Many Challenges to Indonesia’s
Biodiversity
Despite the good chances and opportunities referred to
above, Indonesia is confronted with some real challenges, including a high
population rate, low levels of awareness, the absence of environmental
law enforcement, weak institutional infrastructure and
inadequate development of science and technology concerned with conservation
and utilization of biodiversity.
The country’s forests, estimated to cover over 130 million
hectares, which are the main home of Indonesia’s biodiversity, have been
considered to be over-exploited both by legal forest concession holders and
illegal logging activities. Around 1.6 to 2.1 million hectares of forests are
destroyed every year in Indonesia.
It is worth mentioning that the Tesso Nilo conservation area
in Riau Province, Sumatra, is one of the country’s richest biodiversity
forests. However, Tesso Nilo, which is inhabited among others by rare Sumatran
tigers and elephants, has also been damaged seriously due to logging
activities, particularly for paper and pulp industries. Clearing projects do
not only threaten natural habitats, food chains and the survival of the
Sumatran tiger and elephant, but also that of orangutans, the large apes of
Kalimantan (Borneo Island).
Besides this man-made ‘disaster’, forest fires are also ‘a
main enemy’ that often hit the country. Experts say that actual and potential
harm to Indonesia’s jungles from forest fires is enormous. Forest fires are
usually triggered by cheap land clearing projects undergone by the forest
concession holders and by the El Nino natural phenomenon that brings severe
drought to Indonesia.
A bitter lesson was learned from the 1982-83 and 1994 forest
fires that destroyed 6.4 million hectares of forests, especially in East
Kalimantan.
Ismi Haddad, Executive Director of the Indonesian Biological
Diversity Foundation, Kehati, told workshop participants in Jakarta in 2000,
that many people were not aware that forest fires posed very serious problems
to the preservation of biological diversity. Thousands of flora and fauna
species, including the rare ones, were destroyed during the forest fires.
Crop Biodiversity Lures Colonialists
Indonesia is also a center of crop biodiversity with a wide
range of varieties such as banana (Musa spp.), nutmeg (Myristica fragans) and
cloves (Syzygium aromaticum), which attracted Dutch, Portuguese and British
colonial rulers to come and occupy Indonesia in the 15th century. In the
colonial time, nutmeg was the most valuable commodity after silver and gold for
most Europeans.
According to Setijati D. Sastrapradja, also from the Kehati
foundation, the Russian biologist Vavilov traveled around the world in 1930 to
identify economic plants from many countries. According to the Russian
scientist, there were eight centers of economic plants in the world. But his
student, Chukovski, discovered there were 12 centers rather than eight,
including the “Indonesia-Indochina center of Vavilov”. Vavilov’s study
identified 3,500 edible plants, including four main edible plants such as rice
or paddy, which basically feed the world. Sugarcane, banana and coconut trees
are among edible plants originally growing in Indonesia. Indonesia is currently
not the world’s main producers of these commodities, however.
It is quite ironic that in Indonesia, 1,500 local varieties
of rice have disappeared in the past 15 years. Research on rice conducted by
the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) last year discovered the
remarkable ability of biodiversity to help farmers improve their livelihoods
while protecting the environment and their health. Based on its research in
China, IRRI has found that farmers can use biodiversity to improve their
incomes and profitability while controlling pests and diseases with fewer
pesticide applications. The Philippines-based IRRI has made biodiversity a
central research focus for more than a decade and runs projects exploring its
potential in most Asian nations.
The Right of a Nation
As the second largest megabiodiversity nation after Brazil,
Indonesia has placed great interest in the preservation of biodiversity and the
protection of its people’s rights over knowledge of the science. Indonesia was
among the first signatories of the Earth Summit Convention on Biodiversity and
was represented directly by the then President Soeharto.
However the issue of biodiversity is not only a question of
preservation, but also the right of the nation and her people, especially the
indigenous population who benefit less from the country’s biological wealth
than those who monopolize the technologies to process medicinal plants, mostly
in the West.
Another discouraging fact is that efforts to conserve
biodiversity and to rehabilitate degradation go on at a lesser rate in
comparison with that of the depletion and erosion of the biotic/genetic
resources.
Indonesia’s former minister for population and environment,
Prof. Dr. Emil Salim, once said that empowerment of the Indonesian people is
imperative for the preservation and survival of its biodiversity. He also
commented that poverty tends to push people to harm nature, especially the
forests. So, while Indonesia is still busy fighting against economic crisis and
poverty, the environment will remain in the last of the priority list and
continue to be a victim.
Sources:
§
Kyodo, 2003 - Gap on Environment in Rich, Poor Nations Evident:
World Bank
§
AFP, 1997 - Jungle Animals Exact Lethal Revenge for Indonesian
Fires
§
2000 - Workshop on Biodiversity by Kehati Foundation
§
1998 - Biodiversity for the Survival of Humankind, the Government
of Indonesia
§
1989- ANTARA, Fardah Assegaf - Tropical Rain Forest, A Curse or
Blessing
§
1993, ANTARA, Fardah Assegaf - Acculturation Could Also Mean Loss
of Biodiversity
§
2002 - IRRI - Biodiversity: Adding Value to Rice farming
§
2003, WWF Indonesia - Stop Forest Destruction
Ms. Hani Mumtazah is an environmental
journalist based in Jakarta, Indonesia. She graduated from a three-year English
language non-decree program at the University of Indonesia, Jakarta. She
attended the Non-Aligned News Agencies Journalism Course in New Delhi, India,
in 1987. Comments and suggestions may be forwarded to her by contacting the
editor at: ScienceTech@islam-online.net
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