Can agroforestry ‘win the heart'
of peatland restora5on
agenda ?
A"ek Widaya"
ICRAF Southeast Asia

Land use-peatland induced hazards…
• Fire hazards 1997-8, 2006-7, 2015
• Transboundary haze pollu"on: Indonesia and neighboring
countries (Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines)
• Indonesia as the highest CO2 emiOer from land-based sector

(GFED4s, >www.globalfiredata.org<) --Figure courtesy Guido van
der Werf).
Emi$ng 1,043 Mt CO2eq

onomic damage of 1997/98 fires was estimated to be of the order of 20 billion
D (Varma, 2003)

www.aseanpeat
Southeast Asia
(Wahyunto, et al, 2014)
Indonesia: 14.9M-20M ha

jor Drivers
Food provision à 1M mega ricefield program in 1990sà failure in
technicali"es and managementà large source of fire in C Kalimantan
Pulp and paper industriesà Acacia planta"ons
CPO exports, food-crop commodi"es àOil palm planta"ons

Strategies, agenda and priori5es
Indonesia’s President Joko Widodo inspects peatland in Kal
Photograph: Romeo Gacad/AFP/GeOy Images
We need a new Peatland
Management Authority,
reporting directly to me…
‘Peatland Restora"on
Agency' àmajor
approaches:
- Peatland rewe^ngà
Canal blocking
- Paludiculture
egional (ASEAN):
§ ASEAN Peatland
Management
Strategies
§ ASEAN
Agreement on
Transboundary
Pollu"on
ndonesia??

w about agroforestry prac5ces on peatland ?
c"ve buffers from fires, shown by the low incidence of fires in the area (Sakuntaladewi and Wibow
Dewi et al 2015).

Why agroforest on peatlands:
• Where rewe^ng is not
immediately feasible à e.g
high social cost
• Adap"ve farming for peatla
à mi"ga"ng fire hazards :
low input farming and
mul"strata to maintain hum
environment
• ‘Low-impact
agriculture’ (ASEAN
Strategy)à mi"ga"on of
over-drainage
• Mul"func"onali"es (RE:
‘economy of produc"on
ecology’)
• Local wisdom and knowled
o et al, 2014
ieHnnen et al, 2016

calabilityà op5ons by/in context
WidayaJ, Tata, van Noordw

nclusions and Challenges (over opportuni5es)
Restora"on is not only about plan"ng and replan"ng, providing seeds
and technology, tree-crop preference….
Policies and regula"on reflec"ng good-will and ability are crucial
Challenges :
• For agroforest àit is s"ll considered as plot and farm level prac"ce;
challenged for wider adop"on for peat landscape and peatland restora"on.
• (endemic) tree-plant promo"on: gaps on enabling policies and regula"on,
including incen"ves and disincen"ves à difficult to gain trust and wider
adop"on
• Barriers on market and post harvest regula"on
• Need for capacity strengthening for farmers/local actors incl. to build
partnership, enterprise development
• Further research and assessments à to fill remaining knowledge gaps on the
environmental consequences of peatland management op"ons.