Abstract
In many cases, government institutions lack to consider community areas as a part of their traditional land use in spatial planning policy. The results of numerous investigations into participatory mapping have been insufficiently adopted by Spatial Planning Regulation (SPR). In Indonesia, Spatial Planning Regulation (Rencana Tata Ruang Wilayah / RTRW) is an instrument to guide sectors related to land uses both development and protection. Using a case study for the Merauke district of Papua province in Indonesia, we demonstrate how participatory mapping results can be integrated into SPR. To our knowledge, this is the first successful attempt to integrate important community areas into the regulation of district spatial planning. Participatory GIS (PGIS) was used to map important community areas. There are three phases to the process of combining PGIS with Spatial Planning Regulation. The first phase was to develop a shared vision between the communities and district government and commitment from both parties to accept the final mapping results for use in the further planning process. The second was to facilitate the community to conduct the participatory GIS process and the final phase was to integrate the important community areas into the spatial planning regulation at a scale of 1:50.000 by the RTRW of Merauke district. The total area adopted by the RTRW was about 69% of cultural preservation areas under protected areas. The rest of the important community areas merged into land use allocations within both categories of protected areas (22%) and development areas (9%). In this case, 91% of the community areas were secured from other land use purposes for agriculture, mining, forestry and infrastructure. The PGIS approach can be applied to other districts across Indonesia for mapping the community land use practices in Spatial Planning Regulation.
Highlights
For more than two decades, Participatory GIS (PGIS) has been widely used to support the mapping of community resources in order to secure sources of community livelihood and their cultural value areas
Using a case study for the Merauke district in Papua province in Indonesia, we demonstrate how participatory mapping results of important community areas were integrated into district-level spatial planning through Participatory GIS (PGIS)
The replication of our PGIS approach in Indonesia may be accelerated by government reformation of institutions and regulation as described above. It requires certain skills and knowledge of issues such as spatial planning policies, social culture and customary institutions, natural resource management, communication and technical skills for using GIS. The results of this PGIS case expand on prior studies on the application of PGIS results by effectively securing the important community areas into spatial planning policy and district spatial planning regulation
Summary
For more than two decades, Participatory GIS (PGIS) has been widely used to support the mapping of community resources in order to secure sources of community livelihood and their cultural value areas (such as sacred sites, historical places, ancestor routes). Community mapping is more accepted by the government, due to the state’s recognition of customary right to land as part of the law. In countries such as Mexico, Colombia, and Papua New Guinea, the customary right to land has been formally recognized under state (constitutional) law, and land is clearly allocated for community land use (White et al 2002; Assies 2007), allowing communities to manage their own land and resources. Spatial planning policy contains the necessary local knowledge but has not yet adequately incorporated local community resources.
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