GlobalGiving.org: Indonesian Ecological Restoration & Education

Thriving in Kunir

Gregory Hill — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 21:58:53 GMT

Pak Sumani is doing well

Hello Everyone,

We've just returned to Portland from a two-week visit to our project site in Jepara and Kunir. I was very gratifyint to see the progress the residents of Kunir have made over the past 4 years! Along on the visit were Tim O'Brien, project co-lead with me, Agni Pratama, an economic development expert from Mercy Corps (a global relief and development NGO) and Gabe Wynn from Green Empowerment ( a Portland-based NGO that develops renewable energy systems for villages), along with two members of the Jepara Forest Conservancy board of directors, Adi Sunaryo and Agus Rofiqkoh. We were welcomed, as always, by Pak Sumani the now retired village head. It was great to see him doing well after a period of illness. Here are some highlights of our trip (see the corresponding photos below):

We visited the local Djarum Foundation botanical park and met with the director and several of the staff. They have been planting trees along local roadways and are interested in working farther up on Mt. Muria as well. They made a generous offer of seedlings from their nursury and of high-quality compost.
Along with a number of Kunir village residents, we all visited the reforestation area on Mt. Muria. It was great to see the progress made on the native species ecological restoration. Several residents have identified water supply as an increasingly critical issue. Most likely due to the deforestation of a decade ago, the stream flows coming from Mt. Muria are much diminished. We identified a spring that could be enhanced to bring additional water to the village and surrounding rice fields, but getting the water to Kunir will be a challenge. Gabe Wynn described to us a range of options including the use of "ram pumps", as well as the exciting possibility of integrating micro-hydro electric production. These goals are high on our list for the next year.
Using a grant from UN-GEF (facilitated by our collaborator Iwan Tjitradjaja) a pilot bio-gas project has been completed and is supplying cooking gas to one household in Kunir. The bio-gas digester takes manure from household goats and produces about 3 to 4 hours / day supply of gas. The community is very excited about this development and we are looking into ways to expand it to many more households.
You may recall that we purchased a small number of highly valued Etawa Goats two years ago. Well, that small number grew to approximately 100 goats of which 30 were sold, bringing an additional 10,000 USD into the community! The milk from the goats is also an important benefit - the milk of the Etawa is regarded locally as particularly health promoting.
The native species nursery is really thriving! There are now over 70 different native species seedlings being grown and planting on the degraded slopes above the village. We are seeing some dramatic changes as a result of these plantings and everyone is very motivated to expand both the growing and planting. Our new connection to the Djarum Foundation will be helpful in this regard.
Agni Pratama of Mercy Corps was very excited to see a small nilam oil distiller, developed by a local entreprenuer, in operation at the village site. Nilam oil has a number of applications in the cosmetics industry and fetches a good price in the market. The oil is distilled from a local non-timber forest product gathered in the remaining forests near Kunir. Agni informed us of a novel program that trains local entreprenuers to develop business plans and enter a business plan competition. We plan to spend part of the money donated to our project to fund Kunir residents to develop such a plan for developing a nilam oil village business and submit it to the competition. Stay posted for the results.

All of these remarkable innovations and development have been crucially supported and encouraged by your donations to our project through Global Giving. Thank you so much!

Cheers,

Greg

Adi and Agni discuss future plans with community

Tim and Gabe at Djarum nursery

Tim and Adi investigate compost at Djarum

Gabe and Adi at the JFC reforestation area

Not everyone found the site visit thrilling....

Progress on native species forest restoration

Tim and Saptono at the native species nursery

Agni and Paisan discuss the biogas project

At the nilam oil distillery

The next generation!

Native Plant Nursery Established

Tim O'Brien — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 03:00:10 GMT

Etawa Goats Are Thriving in Kunir

In March, Tim O’Brien, the founder of Tropical Salvage and a facilitator for the Jepara Forest Conservancy, visited Jepara and the JFC forest restoration site on Mount Muria. JFC leaders, Sabtono and Paisan, are currently focused on coordinating two projects. One is creating a native plant and tree nursery in their village, Kunir, which is located near the JFC restoration site. Previously, they acquired tree seedlings to reforest the restoration site from a nursery controlled by Perum Perhutani, the government forestry company that administrates most of the forest land in Java. The majority of seedlings at the government nursery are not native species. They are mainly “productive species” such as sengon and acacia, which are favored for their applications in the pulp and paper industries, or rubber and durian seedlings. In other words, the government nursery provides capacity to create mono-crop plantations that depend on and assist in fueling commodity agricultural markets. Using land to preserve or restore a traditional ecological profile is not a common practice in Java, the world’s most populous island. The Jepara Forest Conservancy believes an adjustment to this perspective on land use is vital to enable a future for the local community that offers food security, cultural integrity and routine access to clean water. JFC seeks to establish a forest garden, or “analog forest” whose biodiversity will provide traditional foods and medicines to local communities, as well as provide micro-habitats for various native fauna. The forest will also protect the watershed, stabilize soil on Mount Muria’s steep slopes and store carbon. The forest’s understory can include a range of productive species to sell in local and export markets such as spices, coffee, bamboo and fruits.

The JFC’s other current focus is choosing from its herd of etawa goats individuals to sell at a goat market that will occur in April. Over two and a half years the herd has grown from thirty-one to sixty-four. Kunir residents who undertook to participate in raising goats will begin in April to realize a return on their investment of time and labor.

Native Plant Nursery at Jepara Forest Conservancy

Michael and Leslie from Paradise Plant visit Kunir

Profile of JFC Board Director Agus Rofiqkoh

Tim O'Brien — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 17:05:54 GMT

Agus with son Luki at the JFC

The Jepara Forest Conservancy’s founding work – its original inspiration and efforts at organizing participants and forming goals – was provided by a handful of community members in Jepara who identified a strong need to improve environmental conditions on the Mount Muria peninsula. None of them had previous experience engaging communities to create forest conservation and restoration plans. They applied the initiative to learn from trial and error and to engage organizations and people who might offer appropriate expertise in a collaborative way toward realizing JFC’s vision.

Agus Rofiqkoh is both a principal member of Jepara Forest Conservancy’s founding team and a current member of its Board of Directors. At nearly every turn during JFC’s history and growth, Agus has been a critically important contributor, both initiating some ideas and facilitating implementation of nearly all of them. Agus Rofiqkoh is an example of what can happen when people grow and envision beyond models of “business as usual” that too often fail to protect natural environments and social contracts. Agus understands that success in implementing environmental restoration strategies and raising social empowerment is integrally dependent on creating strong sustainable businesses. Agus has become an environmental and social activist and spokesperson in Central Java Province. The core theme of his vision to improve social and environmental integrity is: market-oriented solutions.

Agus was born in Semarang, Central Java in 1968. He is the second eldest in a family of eight children. At age thirteen he was forced to drop out of school, both because his family could not afford tuition and because he had to find work to contribute to his family’s aggregate income. At age fourteen, Agus began to work on a passenger bus that traveled between Semarang, Java and Medan, Sumatra. During the eight years he worked for the bus company, he observed Sumatra’s vast primary forests become exploited by international lumber and mining concerns who regard Indonesia’s natural capital as a narrow set of commodity streams rather than a tapestry of intricately interconnected ecosystems and cultures. The business models brought little benefit to local populations: they displaced many people to urban slums and marginalized their native cultures. Ecosystems that had existed since time immemorial, providing bounty for many communities and for countless generations, were destroyed over a few decades. From the early years of Agus’ experience working on busses, he recalls encountering quite a lot of wild life along forest-lined Sumatran roads. He remembers meeting wild boars, elephants, various apes and monkeys and, once, a leopard. Toward the end of his time working with the bus company, some of the forested stretches had been transformed to wastelands dotted with stumps, as far as his eyes could see.

Beginning in 1992, Agus determined to learn wood furniture production. In 1998 he partnered with a Singaporean concern that operated furniture showrooms in Malaysia, Singapore and Hong Kong. Agus believes the significant wealth that was available to many in the teak furniture industry between 1997 and 2002 was precisely related to the devaluation of the resource that occurred when Suharto lost power in 1997. Indonesia grew chaotic during the years immediately following Suharto’s rule. The nation-wide theft of Indonesia’s state-owned teak plantations was one expression of the chaos. Wood deriving from one-hundred and fifty year old teak trees – a historically high-value material – was commonly sold for a fraction of its value. Teak furniture from Indonesia, priced ridiculously cheap, flooded the developed world’s markets.

Agus grew wealthy during the boom, paying college tuition for two of his younger siblings, and lost nearly everything during the bust, when theft and gross mismanagement finally exhausted Indonesia’s mature teak stocks. Agus learned from the experience that, in the future, he would only do business that fairly served its employees and circumspectly respected natural environments. Today, Agus is the Director of Indonesian Operations for Tropical Salvage. Tropical Salvage’s mission is to work in Indonesia’s rural communities to create good, steady, eco-positive jobs building well-crafted, aesthetically distinctive, value-competitive, salvage-wood products; to assist in implementing conservation, forest restoration and environmental education projects to protect the world's remaining primary tropical forests; and to advocate for best responsible social and environmental practices throughout the business world. Agus’ work with the Jepara Forest Conservancy is not compensated with money but it is rewarded enormously with inspiration and satisfaction.

Today, Agus lives in Jepara with his wife, Heni, and his two daughters Meri, aged ten, and Feni, aged one. Agus’ son, Luki, aged twenty, attends law school at the University of Semarang.

Agus at the Conservancy

Restoration Development at the Jepara Forest Conservancy

Tim O'Brien — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 04:38:48 GMT

Dr Iwan Tjitradjaja and Kartika Pamungkas

In Februry, 2010, the Institute For Culture and Ecology enlisted Dr. Iwan Tjitradjaja, chair of the anthropology department at the University of Indonesia, to conduct a social-cultural survey among the people who live in Kunir, a village located at the edge of the Jepara Forest Conservancy forest restoration project whose community the project is designed to directly benefit. The survey was structured to learn the community’s traditional practices and current needs and aspirations so that projects initiated by the Jepara Forest Conservancy might smoothly and efficiently engage and integrate with the community. Since the survey was initiated, Dr. Tjitradjaja has visited the JFC site several times and a colleague, Kartika Pamungkas (Tika), has spent nearly a month living in Kunir, getting to know its people and observing their routines. Through the survey, which is on-going, Dr. Tjitradjaja and Tika have learned a great deal about Kunir. They learned that a strong tradition of practicing gamelan music existed until recently, when challenging economic pressures forced most of the people who owned gamelan instruments to sell them. Traditions of Wayang kulit (shadow puppet) performances and studying and practicing pensilat (an Indonesian martial art) were strong until recent years – perhaps losing favor among a younger generation whose attention is increasingly drawn to the ever-multiplying attractions and distractions of a wired world. Additionally, Dr. Tjitradjaja and Tika have learned many details about how the community’s historically abundant forest resources became degraded. For generations, surrounding primary forests provided the community with important sustainable food and medicinal products, as well as sustainable raw materials for construction and fabrication purposes. Also importantly, for generations the forest’s biological diversity offered a rich tableau of experiences that nourished strong cultural identification. When former president Suharto lost power in 1998, many communities reacted to his thirty-two year iron-fisted reign with anarchic autonomy. One expression of this country-wide, social-economic convulsion was a sharp surge in theft of Indonesia’s mature forests to sell their wood, below established market values, for fast cash. Forests that were protected by legal mandate went up for grabs. Much of Mount Muria’s forestlands, including the area where the JFC site is located, were targets of this misguided exploitation. Today, then, the need among Mount Muria’s communities, and the guiding theme of the Jepara Forest Conservancy’s work, is market-oriented restoration, or restoration development. Dr. Tjitradjaja’s and Tika’s work has proved extremely important in clarifying and strengthening communication between the Jepara Forest Conservancy, the site community and Perum Perhutani, the state-owned forestry company of Indonesia. They have clearly communicated to the site community and Perum Perhutani details of on-going and planned JFC restoration development projects. As Perum Perhutani is a critically important partner in the project's development, Dr. T and Tika have opened the door widely to cooperation. JFC’s success will be Perum Perhutani’s success - adding positively to PP’s reputation and establishing sustainable, ecologically-viable tax revenue streams. Dr Tjitradjaja’s and Tika’s work has also been very effective in emphasizing to people living in Kunir that they are the paramount stakeholder in all JFC work, that their needs and aspirations are a principal driver and navigator in shaping JFC projects. Dr. Tjitradjaja and Tika have observed broad-based support and enthusiasm in the site community for the Jepara Forest Conservancy, as well as broad-based need for its projects. In fact, their survey work assesses it is very appropriate to expand the restoration project boundaries from 36 hectares to 700 hectares in order for the broader Mount Muria community to participate in and benefit from restoration development projects. Furthermore, expansion of forest restoration boundaries will allow the establishment of a Heritage Species Forest Park that is large enough to benefit from a set of government support mechanisms and funding streams accorded to Indonesian forest conservation and restoration sites whose size exceeds 200 hectares. JFC’s current site of 36 hectares is part of a larger 700 hectare area of officially recognized “Protected Forest.” The legal Protected Forest status of the land has not been rigorously supported and today government does not possess the financial capacity to restore the land. The logic of expanding the JFC site to 700 hectares derives from this circumstance and, also, from a belief that the way forward to restorative, sustainable and productive land-use is a collaborative one that combines the needs of a community with administrative support and policy guidance of government, scientific expertise sourced from academia, seed-funding from NGOs and market networks availed by business. In collaboration, then, Dr. Tjitradjaja, Dr. Greg Hill, Dr. Eric Jones and Tim O’Brien are in the process of creating a document that proposes this expansion. Dr. Tjitradjaja will present the proposal to the Director of the Indonesian Department of Forests. Current Status of On-going Jepara Forest Conservancy projects. 1) JFC will continue planting trees at the end of November, the beginning of Central Java’s rainy season. Plantings will coordinate with a map of the Heritage Species Forest Park. They will emphasize tree species native to Central Java, some of which yield products for traditional local use. Dr. Tjitradjaja suggested that the local school might participate in a heritage species seed-collection contest sponsored by JFC.

2) Kunir’s herd of etawah goats has increased, through successful breeding, to 52 – from an original herd of 32. (Two goats have died.) Their diet consists of leaves and grasses that grow naturally and are plentiful around the village. Agus Rofiqkoh, a JFC founder and administrator, has contracted two specialists in breeding and managing etawah goats, Pak Abdulah Piadi and Pak Mialah, to assist and advise goat-owners living in Kunir. Pak Dul and Pak Mialah visit Kunir once a month. Their work includes demonstrations on how to milk etawah goats and how to safely use and store their milk. Pak Agus projects that Kunir goat-owners will begin milking their herd in March or April, 2011. Presently, the price of etawah goat milk fetches a price in the marketplace nearly three times higher than the price of cow’s milk. JFC envisions increasing the goat herd, involving other villages in the project, and establishing a milk collection depot and cheese production facility.

3) Dr. Tjitradjaja and Tika continue their work surveying Kunir’s social and cultural profiles and providing a clear voice to the community for JFC’s project objectives. If the Heritage Species Forest Park receives permission to expand its size to 700 hectares, it will be extremely important that Dr. T’s and Tika’s survey work be expanded to include work in Sumanding, a village located at the edge of the proposed expanded Forest Park.

4) Assisted by Dr. Tjitradjaja and Tika, a biogas development project was initiated by Sabtono, the only teacher working in Kunir’s small grade school, and the Director of LMDH’s (Foundation for Forest Villages) chapter in Kunir. More than half of the 316 families living in Jian District, a part of Kunir where JFC’s work is currently focused, raise cows. The cows are commonly confined to pens in the owners’ yards. Use of cow manure for fertilizer is not common in the area, so cow waste accumulates and creates unsanitary conditions. However, cow manure can provide raw material for biogas production. Biogas technology will turn presently under-utilized cow manure into fuel for cooking stoves and electricity. Sabtono submitted a biogas development grant proposal to the Global Environment Facility Small Grant Program. He received $12,000.00 from GEF SGP.

5) Dr. Greg Hill and Tim O’Brien are working to identify varieties of coffees and spices which are known to grow well in Central Java at elevations consistent with the JFC site and for which ready market demand exists in the U.S. Organic cultivation of coffee and spices is a planned part of the forest park’s understory.

6) JFC is working with Tropical Salvage to identify uses of kapok in products for export. Kapok is a fluffy cream-colored fiber found in seedpods of the randu tree (Ceiba pentandra) which grows commonly in and around the JFC site. The fiber is a mix of lignin and cellulose. It is commonly used in Indonesia as stuffing for pillows, cushions and mattresses. Tropical Salvage has used kapok to create seat cushions and occasional cushions. It plans to submit an order to cushion makers in Kunir after it has introduced product samples at The Las Vegas Market trade show in January, 2011.

7) The Institute for Culture and Ecology funded the acquisition of a solar oven and “Rocket Stove” to enable Kunir to experiment with their use. Tim O’Brien took them to Jepara during his visit to Indonesia in August, 2010. A Rocket Stove is an innovative, fuel-efficient stove design that significantly reduces smoke reduction, thereby reducing health hazards from smoke inhalation and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Its fuel efficiency also reduces the frequency of firewood collection. Agus Rofiqkoh will discuss the stoves with Sabtono, Paisan and Perwanto, village leaders in Kunir who assess and guide JFC projects. If they judge a need and/or desire for the stoves exists among Kunir residents, then IFCAE will coordinate acquiring more of them - perhaps administering a trade of stoves for tree-plantings.

A view of the expanded restoration site

Sabtono, Adi, Paisan, Agus and Tim at the JFC site

New collaboration with Iwan Tjitradjaja

Gregory Hill — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 00:03:14 GMT

Iwan Tjitradjaja at University of Indonesia

In August of 2009, team members Greg Hill and Eric Jones visited the University of Indonesia in Jakarta to meet Dr. Iwan Tjitradjaja, professor of anthropology and expert in social forestry. Through contacts, we had learned of Iwan's long history of working with local communities to promote healthy forests, sustainable livelihoods and cultural resilience. Since our meeting last year, we have kept in touch with Iwan by email, discussing the JFC vision and find a way to engage his expertise. The good news is that Iwan, and his graduate student Tika, are now working to deepen our understanding of the ecological and cultural context and facilitate communication with state and national government representatives.

Iwan and Tika first visited the JFC site and Kunir village from April 8th to 11th, meeting with village head Pak Sumani, touring the village and the JFC site. They discussed the JFC project vision and its implementation, village leadership and politics, economic, social and cultural life and shared their observations with JFC board members Agus, Adi, Yani and Heni in Jepara. Project team member Tim O’Brien met with Iwan and Tika at University of Indonesia soon afterwards and helped to formulate next steps. A second site visit, from April 29th to May 2nd, included meetings with Perum Perhutani (the state-owned forestry company of Indonesia) administrators in Pati and Jepara to discuss and clarify the JFC project vision and mission, as well as continued discussions with the JFC board and Kunir village leadership. Based on these visits and the positive feedback we've received we are moving forward to have Iwan and Tika get involved on deeper levels. Tika will be staying in the village from mid-June to mid August with Iwan making visits to Kunir-Jepara twice a month. Some of the understandings we expect to get from this work are:

• Information on land tenure history and contemporary patterns, kinship, governance, household and village economy. • Local ecological knowledge that could assist with project activities like planting culturally important heritage species. * How the potential influx of funding from the coffee restoration work might impact women. • How the influx of financial resources from the project can be distributed equitably.

This information, and the valuable liaison work that Iwan has already started, will be of tremendous help in making the Jepara Forest Conservancy a truly sustainable project, able to help build thriving communities in a resilient ecosystem for generations to come.

Eric Jones at University of Indonesia

Greg speaks at Kunir village meeting

Sustainable Reforestation Site Visit

Bill Brower — Sat, 08 May 2010 06:16:19 GMT

The JFC crew at their reforesation site

Bill Brower is a Field Program Officer with GlobalGiving who is visiting our partners’ projects throughout South and Southeast Asia. On April 1st he visited the Jepara Forest Conservancy (IFCAE implementing partner) reforestation site near Kunir village (no joke). His “Postcard” from the visit:

I visited this IFCAE-supported project on my last day in Southeast Asia and it was a pleasure to end on such a high note. Deforestation has and is taking a tragic toll on the environment and peoples of Indonesia; it is heartening to know there are organizations like the Jepara Forest Conservancy (JFC) who are taking strides to limit future deforestation and reverse the loss of forest cover.

While the UN bickers over the best way to implement deforestation projects, JFC is implementing what I would call an environmentally and socially sustainable pilot project. (I have some knowledge in the area—my Master’s dissertation dealt partly with forestry in central Africa.) JFC is planting a wide range of native, valuable trees irregularly-spaced on a deforested hillside—a sharp contrast to many of the geometric, monoculture plantations often touted as reforestation. (Just trees do not a forest make.) Following a 75% die-off in their first attempt on their own on a smaller plot, they consulted many experts, including Eric and Greg at IFCAE, and have a 97% survival rate in this area after the first (crucial) year.

But having an environmentally-sound approach will be useless if the conditions that allowed the area to be deforested in the first place are not addressed. Tim O’Brien of JFC says when he came to this area just a few years ago, it was a dense jungle. It was stripped bare by loggers. When JFC started working in Kunir, the community told them any serious conservation effort would need the public forestry agency on board. According to Tim it has been a long process (three years), but the agency has now agreed to help maintain and protect the forest for 30 years—the kind of long range commitment needed for reforestation.

Even if an area is protected on paper, it is still threatened by people illegally logging, so JFC is trying to make the forest more valuable to the community standing than cut down. Many of the trees being planted are fruit bearing, and they are looking into planting coffee. They’re also hoping to create as many “market-based” jobs as possible in the community so people have sufficient alternative sources of income and don’t feel the need to cut down the trees. They’ve provided the some people in the community with a type of goat that produces particularly valuable milk; they’re looking into briquette production from coconut husks and organic spice production.

JFC’s plans are broad and in the preliminary stages but they’ve shown the ability to learn and adapt over time so it seems they will be able to come up with a formula with the community to successfully reforest the surrounding area while improving people’s economic standing. They’re off to a good start.

(p.s. Tim’s company, Tropical Salvage, supports JFC financially and is also playing a role in reducing the drivers of deforestation. They create beautiful furniture out of hardwoods sourced not from standing trees but salvaged from old buildings and out of rivers and swamps and from trees that fall down naturally. Through their outlets in the U.S. they seek to educate consumers about the problems with deforestation in Indonesia, because ultimately without people buying products made from deforested wood the drive to destroy these habitats is greatly diminished. A link to their website is below.)

Shrouded in mist,this area used to be dense forest

Goats

Links:

Progress on Restoration Coffee Effort

Greg Hill — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 03:50:02 GMT

Degraded Land Targeted For Restoration

We have taken the first steps in developing a biologically diverse coffee forest on the degraded slopes of Mt. Muria above Kunir village. We recently brought a renowned expert on community-based coffee production to Kunir for meetings with our team and community members. What an education we got! We were very happy to learn that our site is indeed a good candidate for growing arabica coffee – the premium coffee bean that can contribute to sustainable livelihoods for the residents of Kunir village. Premium coffee requires a shade-grown environment – something in short supply on the degraded mountain above Kunir village. By planting local species of shade tree and plants between the coffee seedlings we will be able to grow first-rate coffee while establishing the foundation of a broader ecological restoration on Mt. Muria. We have identified a 50 hectare section of the Jepara Forest Conservancy site that is best for coffee production. On this steepest part of the site, the first action will be to employ local residents to construct terraces stabilizing steep slopes in grave danger of losing their remaining top soil. This area borders more intact sections of forest higher on Mt. Muria. In these intact patches of forest we have found a healthy population of an endangered primate, the ebony langur, or lutung in the local language. By consulting with primatologists we’ve determined that these primates are not attracted to coffee, and indeed our project will form a buffer zone helping to protect the lutung from human interference. The lutung also features prominently in an important legend in Java, the Lutung Kasarung. In this legend, the lutung is described as a magical creature who can talk with humans. Children in Java are familiar with this story, so having these primates adjacent to our site is a terrific resource for environmental education. We’re very excited about these recent developments. This coffee strategy, which we are calling “Restoration Coffee”, promises to provide an economically sustainable way to achieve our goals of building sustainable livelihoods while promoting ecological restoration and promoting the transmission of cultural and ecological knowledge to the next generation.

Team Member Jones Examining Local Coffee Drying

Ebony Langurs / Lutung

Indonesia Project Update

Eric T Jones — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 22:28:24 GMT

We are continuing to plan for increasing sustainable shade-grown coffee production at the mountain village site in Jepara. U.S. team member Tim O'Brien will be returning to Jepara in March to meet with community members to discuss details. We are excited that we may be able to give Global Giving manager Bill Brower a tour of the various activities we have been supporting in part with Global Giving funds. This includes both the work in Jepara and in the mountain villages.

JFC incorporating sustainably grown coffee into restoration efforts

Eric T Jones — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 19:45:13 GMT

Village member showing existing aribica coffee plants

The JFC project is moving forward nicely. The major part of the planning phase has been completed and the teams are moving forward on implementation. The project has been paying community members to plant several thousand culturally important trees in select areas. This provides some immediate income for workers and shows visible project progress. This summer we had numerous community meetings and met with many representatives from different organizations and governments. One of our goals is to build broad support for the project, intellectually, financially, and through partnerships on activities. One important direction that has emerged is the decision to incorporate sustainable coffee production into the restoration planning. The community currently grows robusta and arabica coffee on a very small scale but is well suited for larger production of arabica. In only a few short years the community will have an additional, stable income while simultaneously working toward longer restoration goals like greater biological diversity and erosion prevention.

High up above the village a simple shelter for work breaks

Village head Pak Sumoni surveying the watershed

Highlights from recent months

Tim O'Brien — Thu, 07 May 2009 00:28:14 GMT

The sign designating the Conservancy land is posted

On July 19, 2008 The Jepara Forest Conservancy (JFC) entered into a Memorandum of Understanding with Perum Perhutani (PP), Indonesia's state-owned forestry management company, to create, implement and manage, for at least thirty years, a Technical Plan for Reforestation Implementation (Rancangan Teknik Pelaksanaan Reboisasi-RTPR) on 260 hectares of Mount Muria, located in north central Java.

In September, 2008, the Jepara Forest Conservancy enabled four young men from villages near the Muria forest restoration site to attend the Learning Farm's organic agro-forestry program, located near Bogor, in west Java. They returned to the community in January to lead in planning and implementing the project's planting and cultivation schedule.

On December 6, 2008 a Jepara Forest Conservancy inauguration ceremony occurred on Mount Muria to recognize and celebrate the Jepara Forest Conservancy’s first forest restoration project. The ceremony occurred in the village Kunir, located on the northwest slope of Mount Muria in Central Java Province, about fifty miles from Tropical Salvage’s principal production facility. Approximately five-hundred people attended the ceremony. Among those who attended were Indonesian government administrators working in Central Java Province, mayors from both the cities Jepara and Semarang, Central Java’s Director of Forestry, Tropical Salvage’s founder, Tim O’Brien, the founders of the Jepara Forest Conservancy, Agus Rafiqkoh and Adi Sunaryo, and hundreds of people living near the forest restoration site. A gamelan band accompanied the event with traditional music and several principal attendees issued statements in support of the project and emphasizing the necessity to modify land-use strategies to reverse trends of environmental destruction and related social instability. The ceremony also initiated a schedule to plant thirty thousand tree seedlings through December.

On April 15, 2009 soil samples from the JFC site were sent for analysis to the Seameo Biotrop Services Laboratory in Bogor, Java. From the analysis we will learn the soil's composition at different parts of the site and to what degree those areas are suited to growing coffee, cacao and other productive crops scheduled for planting. We will learn more about what tree species native to central Java are likely to thrive at the site. We also want to learn what deficiencies the soil might have and, if it has any, what organic strategies we might apply to improve on them. Additionally, we want to know if evidence of chemical pesticides and herbicides exists in the soil and, if so, how pronounced they are and what organic strategies might be applied to reduce them. As JFC will seek organic certification for its products, it's important that chemicals that might have accumulated in the soil be characterized and quantified.

On April 25, 2009 the Jepara Forest Conservancy purchased 21 “Epawa” goats to initiate a herd. Milk from Epawa goats has high nutritional value and is favored in parts of Southeast Asia, including Malaysia and Brunei, where it fetches a high price. Also, the goats’ skin is regarded by leather workers as a high-grade material and is sought after. The goats’ diet is provided by leaves and grasses that are native to and plentiful on Mount Muria. Also, they’ll be raised without antibiotics and without chemical hormones that hasten or enhance growth. Goat manure will figure importantly into blends of organic fertilizers for trees and plants cultivated at the site. The goat project is one of many JFC has planned to bring sustainable, eco-positive jobs to people living around the forest restoration site. Promising discussions with prospective buyers of products deriving from the goats are already underway.

Students who completed the organic agro-forestry program

At the inauguration ceremony for the Jepara Forest Conservancy

Jepara Forest Conservancy earns Government Approval

Stephanie Vasquez — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 20:31:37 GMT

Directors at the Jepara Forest Conservancy have received formal approval from government foresters to proceed with the project! We will cultivate a biodiverse forest garden that benefits the watershed, emphasizes non-timber forest products for trade and job creation, and is structured to qualify as a carbon offset facility. It is expected that credits from JFC will someday providing a continuous revenue stream to supplement our operating budget. In developing this program, we’ve selected *Carbon Conservation and Biodiversity* to conduct independent, third-party oversight. This organization is the best in the market and known for its rigorous reviews.

Thank you for your ongoing support, which is making this success possible!

Planning the Nursery Details

Stephanie Vasquez — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 01:08:22 GMT

Much progress has been made in developing the Jepara Forest Conservancy site. Our next step is to choose an irrigation system and to design the nursery in detail. Greg travels to Indonesia next week with botany and organic agriculture specialists, who will work together with the JFC gardeners, to determine an appropriate mix of plant and tree species. This mix will be composed of indigenous species and appropriate to this beginning stage of the project. After this group provides its recommendations and we secure sufficient funding, we can begin the reforestation effort!