Jakarta, July 17, 2014. Discussion and establishment of the Regulation on Protection and Management of Peat Ecosystems must be transparent and participatory to realize Strong and Comprehensive Peat Ecosystem Protection.

The Draft Government Regulation on the Protection and Management of Peat Ecosystems (Peat Regulation) is one of the 21 Government Regulations that must be created to implement the mandate of Law Number 32 of 2009 concerning Environmental Protection and Management. Specifically, this regulation is prepared taking into account the provisions of articles 11, 21, 56, 57, 75, and 83 of Law No. 32 of 2009.

The Civil Society Coalition for Forest and Global Climate Rescue views that the protection and management of peatland areas in Indonesia are crucial and urgent amidst various natural resource management issues and potential environmental damage that exist today. The rapid expansion of plantation and other extractive industries, targeting not only mineral lands and primary forests but also peatlands, especially peatlands with a thickness of less than 3 meters that are legally allowed for government use through Presidential Decree No. 32 of 1990 on Protected Area Management. Although this regulation provides protection for peatlands with a depth of more than 3 meters, it does not automatically solve the peatland issues because in reality, peatlands with different depths may constitute an ecosystem unit or be within the same area. Therefore, the utilization of peatlands less than 3 meters will affect the protected peatlands.

According to the information received by the Coalition, the discussion and finalization process of the Peat Regulation has entered its final stages. The Ministry of Environment has issued the final revision draft which will then be approved by the President (SBY). However, it is regrettable that public consultations on the changes in the draft and academic manuscript of the peat regulation have not been conducted openly with the community until now.

The current substance of the peat regulation is considered unable to address the environmental disasters that have frequently occurred in the last 17 years, such as forest and peat fires, which have cost the state tens of trillions of Rupiah and damaged diplomatic relations between countries. The Coalition believes that the management model outlined in the current Peat Regulation will automatically pose a significant risk of damage to the peat ecosystem.

National Executive Campaign Manager of WALHI, Zenzi Suhadi, explained, “The Peat Regulation has the potential to become a path for the Ministry of Environment to become a tool that washes away the people’s rights over peatland areas. This regulation carries interests that pose a risk to the damage of peatlands and the existence of communities living within and around the peat ecosystem.”

According to Zenzi, “When compared with the Law on Environmental Protection and Management as the legal umbrella for the Peat Regulation, several conclusions can be drawn; first, this regulation tends to regulate authorities in providing areas for large-scale plantations and other sectoral industries based on other licensing risks that may create new agrarian problems. Second, the Peat Regulation still forms part of a lenient perspective that forgives the ongoing environmental destruction by being permissive towards business permits and/or activities utilizing the peat ecosystem for protection and cultivation purposes. Third, the Peat Regulation does not stem from the reality of the lives of communities within and around peatlands and can potentially become a means of legitimizing the separation of people’s lives from their environment in terms of access rights and environmental services.”

Currently, indigenous and local communities managing peatlands face at least two serious threats: 1) land grabbing and territorial restrictions due to the granting of large-scale peatland management concessions by the government that disregard the rights of communities (especially timber estates and palm oil), and the destruction of the Peat Ecosystem which in turn damages their livelihoods.

“The aspect of protecting the rights of indigenous and local communities in peatlands, especially their tenure rights, has not been fully guaranteed, both in the current peatland governance practices and in the Peat Regulation which lacks the mention of rights,” said Sisilia Nurmala Dewi, forestry and climate change program staff from Perkumpulan HuMa.

“The Pe