Interactive map provides tools for corporate accountability and local land-use planning
« New Papua Atlas tracks impact of plantations, roads on forests » by Barbara Fraser, 05/10/2018, Forests News
Indonesia – Thanks to its remote location and sparse population, Indonesian Papua, on the western side of the island of New Guinea, harbors one of the Pacific’s last remaining expanses of pristine tropical forest. But recent spikes in deforestation rates, accompanied by the expansion of industrial oil palm plantations, are signs that rapid change is on the horizon.
Scientists hope a new interactive atlas that tracks
deforestation annually will enable local governments to plan for the
change and avert widespread destruction of the forests on which
indigenous people depend for food and livelihoods.
“The Papua
Atlas will show where forest is being cleared on the island and who is
responsible for the deforestation,” said David Gaveau, a research
associate with the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR),
who will demonstrate a prototype of the atlas at the International Conference on Biodiversity, Ecotourism and Creative Economy (ICBE) in Manokwari, Papua, on Oct. 7 to 11.
The platform, due to launch in mid-2019, will track deforestation on a monthly basis over the long-term.
Local
government officials in charge of spatial planning welcome the
development of the atlas, which they can use to help plan land use as
the local population grows and demand for roads and other services
increases in tandem. For example, the annual data provided by the atlas
will provide insight into the dynamics of forest loss and the expansion
of industrial oil palm concessions, and roads into forested areas.
Old-growth forest in Indonesian Papua shrank by 2 percent, a loss of 600,000 hectares, between 2000 and 2017 (Fig. 1).
Annual
forest loss in Indonesian Papua has accelerated gradually since 2000,
reaching a peak in both provinces in 2015 and 2016, with 98,000 hectares
and 85,000 hectares lost, respectively, before dropping markedly in
2017 (Fig. 1b & c).
Meanwhile, industrial plantations, mainly
for oil palm, have nearly quadrupled since 2000, with the largest
expansion in Papua province. Gaveau’s studies indicate that about 30
percent of all forest loss since 2000 has been due to clearing for
industrial plantations.
“The island of New Guinea is perhaps the last large equatorial island
that is still pristine,” Gaveau says. “It is still 90 percent natural
forest, and it is sparsely populated.”
Because of its distance
from key trading routes, Pacific ports and cities, it is expensive to
install industrial facilities, such as palm oil refineries in Indonesian
Papua. But the island is not immune to the spread of the palm oil
industry, which has expanded throughout other islands, such as Borneo.
“As prime land becomes scarce on other islands, companies are turning their eyes to Papua,” Gaveau says.
That’s where the Papua Atlas comes in.
The interactive map is similar to the Atlas of Deforestation and Industrial Plantations in Borneo, also known as the Borneo Atlas, which Gaveau, a landscape ecologist, and Mohammad Agus Salim a Geographic Information Systems expert with CIFOR,developed to monitor deforestation on that island. The Borneo Atlas allows users to verify the location and ownership of more than 460 palm-oil mills on Borneo and monitor deforestation in the surrounding area.
Data about ownership show which companies linked to plantations are encroaching on forests and peat lands.
“The
principle of the Papua Atlas is the same,” Gaveau says. “The
overarching idea is to hold companies accountable for the deforestation
they might have caused, whether or not it is done legally. The idea is
that the Indonesian local and national governments can check those
deforestation footprints in concessions to review the permits.”
For more information, contact David Gaveau: D.Gaveau@cgiar.org and Mohammad Agus Salim: moh.agus.salim@gmail.com