Growing Trees and Economies in Indonesia

Growing an economy can have its fair share of consequences for nature. East Kalimantan has a 30-year legacy of forest loss and degradation due to increased logging, palm oil production, mining and fire. But at The Nature Conservancy (TNC), we believe that there is economic opportunity in protecting the environment and addressing climate change. We are helping the region develop green growth strategies to sustainably harvest forests while still providing for communities and wildlife.

TNC and the government of Indonesia’s East Kalimantan Province created the Green Growth Compact, a unique partnership consisting of 25 companies and government agencies. The goal of the Green Growth Compact is to reduce emissions in East Kalimantan by 1,000 tons of CO2 per HK$7.8 million GDP while increasing economic growth by 8 percent. As a leading partner in the Compact, TNC made important gains in three key Compact initiatives:

• We have distributed 1,700 smartphones to more than 160 villages impacting over 500,000 people. The phones are loaded with an app that helps villagers to implement our tested community engagement approach to conserve their forests and improve their livelihoods.
• We provided a suite of best management practices that will enable 10 public and private partners to conserve critically endangered orangutans across more than 900,000 acres.
• We developed tools and recommendations to help strengthen sustainable management approaches for ecological, social and economic outcomes across the province’s public forests.