Community-Based Disaster Management and Forest Fires in East Kalimantan Indonesia

Forest fires have become increasingly common in East Kalimantan, Indonesia. Most fires are caused by human activity, aggravated by the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO). The World Bank estimated that only 1% of forest fires are caused by natural events and the rest by human activities. In 1997, fires caused a total loss of US$9.3 billion for Indonesia.

The widespread destruction of ecosystems has forced farmers to seek other livelihood strategies outside of agriculture such as illegal logging, small trading and coconut farming. Indicators such as nutritional status of children have given rise to grave concerns for affected communities. Proxy food security indicators such as stunting and wasting of children under five remain high in the most affected areas. (CARE, 1998). The malnutrition figures indicate that there are other issues besides natural resources management, and that a humanitarian strategy focusing on livelihoods is needed.

In response to this situation, CARE developed a household livelihood security (HLS) approach to disaster management. The approach helps establish locally initiated disaster mitigation measures along with environmentally sustainable land use management practices.

CARE DISPRE (DISaster PREparedness) Approach to Forest Fire Management

The project in East Kalimantan has been running for one year and has received positive responses from local communities and other stakeholders. Although the project targets fire-prone forest communities, it does not focus only on forest fires and seeks to reduce community vulnerability to other disasters such as rat infestation of crops and floods.

The program consists of six clusters of activities: participatory action and learning (PLA), training in disaster management, building local emergency response capacity, improving land use mapping, organizing stakeholder planning workshops and establishing stakeholder forums on disaster management at the sub-district level.

Some of the activities currently facilitated by the project are:

• Banana relay-planting with rubber cultivation: Farmers found that planting banana trees in rubber plantations provided effective firebreaks as well as extra income.

• Contracts for leasing land: Land lease contracts facilitate better land use planning between the more established settlers and recent migrants. The project introduced a land leasing concept that allows original land claimants to retain their rights but enables new arrivals to cultivate the land with perennials such as rubber and fruit trees. The trees belong to the claimants but the harvests are shared by both parties.

• Cultivating productive firebreaks: Communities have established permanent firebreaks around their villages, rubber plantations and home gardens with crops producing minimum biomass, such as onions.
• Forest fire brigades: In some communities, villagers are organizing fire brigades based on existing social organizations, like farmer associations. The project facilitates training and helps communities extend the brigades’ responsibilities to include early warning.

• Establishing paddy fields on burned peat swamps: Drought and subsequent peat fires destroyed many coconut plantations. Growing paddy helps prevent further burning and provides income.
  
  The disaster management training helps participants learn from their experiences. This has proved to be a successful strategy as shown by the activities initiated under the training curriculum, which include helping communities deal with other stakeholders, facilitating local NGOs interested in developing disaster management programs, and promoting conflict resolution.

Some Conclusions

• Disaster management initiatives need to be integrated into community development activities.

• Approaches to disaster management need to take into account divergent perceptions to land tenure and agricultural practices.

• Private sector companies competing with local communities for natural resources can have significant positive and negative impacts on community livelihoods. CARE tries to involve the private sector in its community disaster management approaches and help villagers communicate their interests to the companies. Joint training sessions allow company management to incorporate community interests along with disaster and conflict management strategies into their development activities.

• Successful disaster management requires building up confidence and overcoming fatalistic attitudes common among people in disaster-prone areas.

• Training in humanitarian standards, such as the SPHERE standards, increase community members’ understanding of their entitlements for emergency assistance, especially when they are no longer able to cope on their own.

The authors thank Bud Crandal, Country Director CARE International in Indonesia, Lise Schofield (Senior Programme Co-ordinator and Hadi Sutjipto, Emergency Team Leader, for their support and comments on earlier drafts of the full paper.