ABSTRACT
The total forest area1 of Indonesia is 131.3 million ha, which is about 69.9% of the total terrestrial territory of Indonesia. However, the forest cover inside the state forest area is only 133,327.2 ha, which is only about 0.1% of designated forest area (Ministry of Forestry 2012). This implies that deforestation rates in Indonesia are very high. Based on satellite imagery, the Ministry of Forestry reported that deforestation inside the state forest area in Indonesia during 2009/2010 was 610,375.9 ha. Deforestation in Indonesia is mainly caused by fi re, conversion of forest and peat-land to other land uses, mining, and forest degradation due to illegal logging and poor forest management practices (Ministry of Forestry 2012). Deforestation in the islands of Kalimantan and Sumatra was remarkably high compared with other islands in Indonesia (Holmes 2002). In the period between 1985 and 2007, forest loss in Sumatra alone was reported to be more than 70% of total forest area (Laumonier et al. 2010).
