A part of Master of Science in Forestry thesis presented for USAID-CIFOR Fellowship workshop at Washington, DC, April 28, 2018.

1. RESTORING DEGRADED TROPICAL PEATLANDS:
CASE STUDIES FROM CENTRAL KALIMANTAN, INDONESIA
Dyah Puspitaloka
Dr. Yeon-Su Kim (advisor) | Dr. Peter Z. Fulé & Dr. Herry Purnomo (committee member)
KNOWLEDGE GAP
Peatland restoration projects are being carried out
without:
• Clear definition of 'ecological restoration’;
• Shared goals;
• Resources for sharing lessons learned;
• Consideration of various costs (both direct and indirect
costs).
Watch my research video:
bit.ly/CentralKalimantanPeatlands
INTRODUCTION
At least four different restoration projects in Central
Kalimantan - public & private investments:
1. NGO partnered with national park,
2. Government partnered with NGO,
3. Private sector partnered with NGO,
4. Private sector partnered with a university.

2. RESEARCH QUESTIONS:
1. How ecological restoration is being defined and what are the restoration goals articulated by different proponents?
2. What are planned activities and their project durations?
3. What are the challenges faced by different proponents?
4. What are direct and indirect costs of peatland restoration and how do they affect the total costs of restoring
peatlands at different temporal scales and socio-ecological context?
METHODS
Data collection
• Site visit to 4 restoration sites,
• In-depth interviews with 47 key-informants from 20 different institutions ~ 39 hours of interviews.
Data analysis
• Transcribing the audio recordings using F5 Transcription PRO.
• Developing final template of coding and codebooks.
• Coding using NVivo for Mac version 11.4.3.
RESULTS & DISCUSSIONS
Social Dimensions of defining ecological restoration in Indonesia?
• Respondents from all four projects incorporated some social aspects in their definitions of peatland restoration (8 to
32%).
• Understanding local communities and securing their supports  to increase voluntary participation and reduce
anthropogenic pressure.

3. 3
Social dimensions of Ecological Restoration in the United States
• The Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration (CFLR) programs recently demonstrated the
importance of engaging the communities and collaborating with multi-stakeholders.
Why is defining 'ecological restoration’ critical?
• To build strong foundation of restoration practices.
• To ensure the quality of restoration process and outcomes.
How to deal with this issue?
• Redefine ecological restoration and establish standards to encompass both social and ecological
dimensions, to allow more integrated restoration practices.
Status quo
• Society for Ecological Restoration primarily embraced the ecological fidelity.
• However, the scientific and social trends are increasingly call for the needs to continuously
redefine ecological restoration (Higgs 1997, Higgs et al. 2014, Martin 2017).
• In developing countries, rural communities do not have access and capital; and highly dependent
for ecosystem’s goods and services for their livelihood.
• Some of the community practices pose for socio-economic challenges to restoration proponents.