Program of Community Empowerment Prevents Forest Fires in Indonesian Peat Land

Abstract

Abstract The number of hotspots that indicate forest and land fire in peat land is the highest in Indonesia, particularly in both Riau and West Kalimantan provinces. Ministry of forestry has run several programs to overcome this problem such as monitoring hotspots, campaigning for forest fire prevention, conducting coordination between government and local governments. However, the main cause of this problem has not been solved because the local communities that are around the forest or peat land area still have social and economic problem. Therefore, this paper described how to solve the problem by involving and emerging the awareness of its local community through program of community empowerment. The concept of the program has to be designed sophisticatedly by paying attention in balance between community resources and its program objective as sustainable development. Based on some previous experiences, there are three areas as the main suggestion that have to be done simultaneously; First is managing land resource; second is activating institutions in village; and the last is diversifying economic activities in village. The program also needed collaboration among local government, extension institution, Ministry of Forestry through manggala agni (taskforces, who overcome forest fires), farmer groups, village government officials.