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The forest around Manjau in Borneo once reverberated with the scream of chainsaws, as gangs of illegal loggers felled ancient hardwood trees for sale to timber merchants downstream.
But many loggers in the remote Indonesian village are hanging up their chainsaws in return for affordable healthcare, through a community incentive scheme that aims to save lives and protect Borneo's fragile rainforests.
This strategy is set to be rolled out elsewhere in Indonesia, where impoverished communities often reliant on illegal industries for survival are putting enormous strain on the environment.
In western Borneo, where the approach was first pioneered, logging had long been the lifeblood of many communities, providing quick cash whenever it was desperately needed for weddings or health emergencies
A single Bornean ironwood—a rare, slow-growing giant prized for its durable timber—could fetch hundreds of dollars at a lumber mill, a small fortune for local villagers.
But for Juliansyah, a father-of-two from Manjau, the income was unreliable and the work—often involving days-long missions alone in the forest—was tiring and dangerous.
[...] His village was eventually approached by Alam Sehat Lestari (ASRI), a non-profit organisation based in nearby Sukadana and made an unusual offer.
If they agreed to cease logging, the entire village would be granted discounts on medical bills at the local health clinic, and free training for new careers as forest custodians and farmers.
The incentives have worked, says American physician Kinari Webb, who co-founded ASRI and established Oregon-based charity Health in Harmony, its key financial backer.
Of the 24 villages surrounding Gunung Palung, all but one have agreed to put down their chainsaws, Webb said. Since 2007, when ASRI started working with villages, the number of logging households has plunged from nearly 1,400 to 180.
The rampant destruction of the old-growth forest Webb encountered when she first arrived in western Borneo 22 years ago has slowed to a trickle, with degraded areas slowly regrowing.
(Score: 2) by edIII on Monday September 19 2016, @10:35PM
The other option is just to kill the mill owner and then raze the mill. In this case it seems like the logging is an incredibly bad option for Borneo, so why doesn't the government just shut down the mill instead?
This is a private citizen effectively using their money to provide the base needs that these villagers do not have from the Borneo government. I'm betting that the money, while laden with nice intentions, is only propping up corrupt industries and practices in Borneo with nearly all of it being exploitative in nature against the villagers.
If you really wanted to solve the problem, there are about a half-dozen to a dozen individuals that could be removed from Borneo permanently. By whatever means. Once you seize those resources... I sincerely doubt desperate villagers will need to cut down trees to survive, as they could survive off their own production once the parasites are taken care of.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 19 2016, @11:33PM
> so why doesn't the government just shut down the mill instead?
Because the government is captured by the mill owner.
> I sincerely doubt desperate villagers will need to cut down trees to survive, as they could survive off their own production once the parasites are taken care of.
Lol. That's some crazy violent communist revolution shit you are advocating. Worked great for Mao.
(Score: 3, Touché) by khallow on Monday September 19 2016, @11:39PM
The other option is just to kill the mill owner and then raze the mill. In this case it seems like the logging is an incredibly bad option for Borneo, so why doesn't the government just shut down the mill instead?
Yes, let's murder people for trees. I suppose it is cheaper than bribing them to stop chopping down trees.
This is a private citizen effectively using their money to provide the base needs that these villagers do not have from the Borneo government. I'm betting that the money, while laden with nice intentions, is only propping up corrupt industries and practices in Borneo with nearly all of it being exploitative in nature against the villagers.
So is the mill owner who is providing jobs and opportunity. And let us note the only reason those private citizens are bribing Borneo residents to stop chopping trees is because there are mill owners and lumberers. Otherwise, they wouldn't care in the least about desperate people. Can't see the forest for the trees.
Anyway, on your rabid post, there is a pattern [soylentnews.org] here. Once again, your cure is worse than the disease.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday September 20 2016, @06:44PM
You don't murder the sawmill owner, you do much worse, you drag him through the courts for a decade while his mill is impounded.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday September 21 2016, @12:46AM
you do much worse, you drag him through the courts for a decade while his mill is impounded.
Or we could just not do that and have more jobs for poor people in Borneo. I don't buy that the primary problem here is that there are mills, but rather that these forests are being stripped away in unsustainable ways. If you really are regulating to the point that you can effectively shut down mills for this whole region, then you can regulate effectively enough sustainable forestry practices. It's not going to be identical to untouched wilderness, but things can be far better than they currently are without destroying a region's economy and causing enormous suffering for its people.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday September 21 2016, @12:17PM
Compared to 50 years ago, the forests are stripped, period. The only forests that aren't stripped now are the ones that are currently economically prohibitive to convert to palm-oil plantation. Borneo has some pretty rugged terrain, so there's still a lot of that, but with bigger equipment they'll get ever deeper into what little forest is left.
"Sustainable forests" are somewhat better than rotating corn/wheat fields, but they still strip the land of 99% of its biodiversity, leave it open to wasting disease, and provide little- if any- shelter or support for migrating species.
As for jobs, 100 acres of palm oil plantation does provide jobs, much better than 100 acres of wood production. So, we can engage a couple of humans per 10 acres in the production of palm oil, or a couple of humans per 100 acres of sustainable wood production. Or, we can put up schools, teach them a couple of global languages, and make Borneo a tech support call center for the world - that will provide a couple of jobs per acre. If you "let the market decide" we'll just be getting whatever provides the biggest return in the next 90 days (including speculative investment in future returns, which is severely discounted for anything beyond a 5 year horizon.)
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday September 21 2016, @02:03PM
"Sustainable forests" are somewhat better than rotating corn/wheat fields, but they still strip the land of 99% of its biodiversity, leave it open to wasting disease, and provide little- if any- shelter or support for migrating species.
Unless, of course, that is wrong. Sure, I can see a significant loss of diversity from this approach and that is a cost though not a significant one (I think rainforest species are vastly overrated), but I don't buy your second claim at all. In addition to those losers, there will be winners who can exploit that kind of forest.
As for jobs, 100 acres of palm oil plantation does provide jobs, much better than 100 acres of wood production. So, we can engage a couple of humans per 10 acres in the production of palm oil, or a couple of humans per 100 acres of sustainable wood production. Or, we can put up schools, teach them a couple of global languages, and make Borneo a tech support call center for the world - that will provide a couple of jobs per acre. If you "let the market decide" we'll just be getting whatever provides the biggest return in the next 90 days (including speculative investment in future returns, which is severely discounted for anything beyond a 5 year horizon.)
Or you know, we could teach your grandmother to suck eggs. They can do the math too and we have here: 1) They don't own most of that land and hence, can't exploit it with palm oil plantations (else we probably would have a lot less unsustainable clear cutting and burning). 2) which may not actually be that lucrative or viable here. 3) You have the opposite problem with respect to the tech support call center - it's too long term and doesn't help solve Borneo's problems in a timely manner. 4) There's also the risk that the business model becomes obsolete by the time you have skilled labor for the scheme.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday September 21 2016, @06:33PM
In addition to those losers, there will be winners who can exploit that kind of forest.
In about a million years when they evolve to exploit it, which actually will never happen since we change our minds too often about which single crop species is "in demand" this decade and keep switching the monoculture from one to the next. Even the forestry management wonks who spend all their time and energy helping forest land owners (like myself), acknowledge that a monoculture pine stand in the SouthEast United States is a desert for wildlife. The almond groves of California are a heaven for pests and disease while simultaneously dependent upon pollinators that are killed by the same chemicals used to control the pests. And, the US federal government pays farmers to leave farmland unplanted both to keep market supply of food in check, and to provide habitat for migrating bird species that would otherwise suffer from the boom/bust cycles of row crop food availability. That's what wilderness provides, a diversity of species with a continuum of food availability - when a single species has a challenge, there are a dozen others that fill in the gap. When you reduce that diversity to a monoculture crop, anything that eats the crop is a pest, and the pests can, and do, evolve to take advantage of the crop homogeneity - at the expense of the farmer.
we could teach your grandmother to suck eggs
I think where we're missing each other here is in the definition of value. Giving the poor something to do that gets them money from the open market is great. But, I believe you are the one who pointed out the tragedy of the commons. The air we all breathe is the commons, the wild forest/swamp/ocean/desert/plains/name-your-ecosystem (that you, personally do not value) is our common heritage, one that we still do not understand, and - as products of it - may lack the capacity to fully understand, the same way that our brains have a significant challenge explaining how our brains really work. I'd much rather the loggers continue extracting value from the native forests in a sustainable way, but sustainable logging of old growth forests generates tiny profits as compared to a quick clear-cut, and that's why an investment fund buys land: to extract its value as profitably as possible. To me, and really everybody else other than the people who invest in land to make a profit, the best use of wild lands is to preserve them. As little wild land (and ocean, when you look at what bottom-trawl nets are doing) is left, it is past time to start restoring land to its wild state and preserve the value of biodiversity, which may be difficult to quantify on a balance sheet, but will be incalculably expensive to reproduce when it is gone.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday September 21 2016, @10:48PM
In about a million years when they evolve to exploit it
Nonsense. There's always something out there that can move in. You gave examples.
but sustainable logging of old growth forests generates tiny profits as compared to a quick clear-cut
That's false. You neglect the value of the land afterward. Sure, if the old forest can be turned into high profit urban sprawl or something that has higher profit per unit area (like your allegations about palm oil), then clear cutting is more profitable. If it can't, then the payoffs change to favor sustainable logging. Private lumber companies which own the land they use figured this out.
As little wild land (and ocean, when you look at what bottom-trawl nets are doing) is left, it is past time to start restoring land to its wild state and preserve the value of biodiversity, which may be difficult to quantify on a balance sheet, but will be incalculably expensive to reproduce when it is gone.
Yea, you'd have to leave it alone for a while, preferably next to an existing patch of wilderness.
The problem here is that you continue to ignore seven billion humans. Making efforts to preserve diversity is nice, until a huge horde of poor people destroys it. Then it becomes another waste of time and resources. The developed world has shown us how to solve the problem. Make everyone wealthier, educate women, and we get a society that has negative population growth, can afford to protect the environment, and develops the technology to do so. It's already working for a billion people in the world so it's not like we haven't figured out how to scale it to relevant size.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday September 22 2016, @03:51AM
Biodiversity is the open market of nature - competition, survival of the fittest.
Seven billion (and counting) humans have twisted nature to "controlled economies" where production is dictated. While this type of production has its place, it isn't nearly as efficient or robust as the 99% planet-wide wild ecosystems of 5000 years ago and before. Yes, the wild brings plagues of locusts, floods, fires, and other things that generally upset suburban residents, but in general, the wild deals with these challenges gracefully, and recovers quickly, and does often let them spiral out of control.
We have 20 acres of land in central Florida, it was logged in the 1800s and basically ignored since then (most neighboring properties have been cleared to some degree or another in the last 40 years). On our land, we cut in a 1/2 mile of road. Where the ground was disturbed by the clearing work, there have been dense fire ant colonies for the last 15 years. Get off the disturbed earth into the woods, sure, there are still fire ant mounds, but at less than 1% of the density you find on the "recently" cleared road. Neighbors who cleared their land have fire ants basically everywhere. It's Florida, it has mosquitoes, but again, they're mostly in the engineered drainage areas, when you get into the areas of "natural standing water" or down by the natural-ish riverbank, there are still mosquitoes, but not in nearly the same density as the drainage ditches and their overflows.
I'd like to see more tree farms that value the future value of their land and work to develop that value... sadly, the tree farms I know of mostly do not do this. They plant, thin for maximum growth, and usually clear-cut around 30 years, starting over with a fresh stand of whatever is the most profitable at the time. And, you're wrong about wildlife in the tree farms - especially slash pine in the southeast, it's not home to much, we toured pine farms in Texas and Georgia for years - the bottom lands with broadleaf does support some wildlife, and the odd turkey or deer will wander into a pine plantation, but not for long - there's little food and less cover from predators, not that there are many predators that don't wear bright orange in the tree farms anymore.
🌻🌻 [google.com]