The World Trade Organization (WTO) hailed the recent Hong Kong Sixth Ministerial Meeting last December 2005 as a positive movement towards the conclusion of the Doha Development Round. The round was supposedly geared towards ensuring that trade contributes to the development objectives of least…
Indonesia is a Southeast Asian archipelago consisting of some 17,500 equatorial islands (6,000 of which are inhabited) stretching in an east–west direction over 5,000 kilometers. It has a land area of 1.83 million square kilometers; in 2000 this supported a population of 203.5 million (the…
This article explains the historical development of the water regime in Indonesia and analyses the position of water rights and human rights to water under Indonesian Constitution. It elaborates the key provisions of Indonesian water law and analyses the legal consequences of the review in order…
The promotion of forestry activities is seen as a means by which to reduce poverty while protecting the environment. But if clearing of forests for agricultural activities can prove more profitable, will such efforts be effective? Through an analysis of the relative benefits of agriculture and…
Insight: Notes from the Field is a response to this need, and with this publication, we aim to give practitioners a forum to share field level cases and lessons in Community Forestry (CF) or Community-Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM). In this edition of Notes from the Field, there are…
It is often suggested that the poor are credit-rationed due to their lack of formal collateral. Using a household survey from Indonesia, we estimate the impact of having a land title on formal credit access. Adopting an instrumental variable approach, we find that having a formal title…
While external forces can take many forms, such as the shock of a natural disaster which destroys productive assets, or the long-term ‘trend’ of consistently declining market prices which limits net incomes, the focus of this research is on the policy and institutional environment both within…
Monthly measurements of carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) fluxes in peat soils were carried out and compared with groundwater level over a year at four sites (drained forest, upland cassava,upland and lowland paddy fields) located in Jambi province, Indonesia. Fluxes…
The report describes the impacts of forestry decentralization on district finance, local communities and spatial planning, drawing on an 18-month research project in Bulungan District in East Kalimantan Province. It describes forestry management policies following the implementation of regional…
Local people in South-east Asia are often cited as skilled forest managers. It is barely acknowledged that an essential part of this forest management does not concern natural forests, but forests that have been planted, often after the removal of pre-existing natural forests; forests that are…