Category: Community

On a Philippine island, indigenous groups take the fight to big palm oil

Palm oil tramples indigenous people's rights.
  • Many Palawan indigenous communities say they have suffered unfair land acquisition or lease arrangements for oil palm plantations. The situation hit a peak around 2007, when palm oil company Agumil Philippines promoted palm oil around the island as a miracle get-rich-quick crop.
  • Many tribal landowners leased or sold parcels of land to Agumil. Those who leased said they were provided loans from the government-run Land Bank of the Philippines, negotiated by Agumil, to clear the land and plant oil palm saplings. Title deeds to the leased land were lodged with the bank as collateral against the loans, where they remain.
  • Today the plantations are producing plentiful bunches of oil palm fruit. Still, landowners say they have yet to see any financial returns on their leased land. The problem all cite is that the loans came with crippling 14 percent annual interest rates, which left the original loan amounts inflating out of control. The terms of the lease contracts also stipulate that ongoing operational and managements costs be subtracted from the loan and harvest income.
  • Now tribal groups are fighting back on multiple fronts. A tribal representative in the municipality of Rizal recently won a mayoral election. The re-elected mayor of neighboring Brooke’s Point has also pledged a halt to more oil palm plantations. Three of the seven municipalities in southern Palawan have now placed limitations on oil palm cultivation.
  • The sandy path from the village of bamboo houses winds down through the coconut palms, which gives way to mangroves growing along the muddy shoreline. The seven elders inspect their fishing boats. Hand-built using timber from their communal forest, the small craft have bamboo outriggers to keep them stable in the open sea.

The Sarong community on the island of Palawan in the Philippines has for generations been living a similar way of life from the forest, cultivated fields, stands of coconut and fishing. But a few years ago, in 2012, their lives were turned upside down when they noticed that their communal forest was being logged and cleared without any consultation, let alone their permission.

“A contractor coming from another barangay [village] was clearing the land,” says Romeo L. Japson, who grew up in the community.

Community members say the company responsible then went on to plant oil palm saplings on 200 hectares (500 acres) of their ancestral land. They add that now, every time they pass by the plantation, they’re reminded of how their community forest was razed. To this day they are bitter that the situation persists and they have no redress.

They are not alone, as many other Palawan indigenous communities have also suffered what they see as unfair land acquisition or lease arrangements for oil palm plantations. The situation hit a peak around 2007, when palm oil company Agumil Philippines promoted palm oil around the island as a miracle get-rich-quick crop. Twenty-five percent Filipino- and 75 percent Malaysian-owned, Agumil is a subsidiary of Agusan Plantations (API) and operates the only palm oil processing plant on Palawan.

Now tribal groups are fighting back on multiple fronts. A tribal representative in the municipality of Rizal recently won a mayoral election. The re-elected mayor of neighboring Brooke’s Point has also pledged a halt to more oil palm plantations. Three of the seven municipalities in southern Palawan have now placed limitations on oil palm cultivation.

Meanwhile, a growing number of communities are responding to threats to their ancestral domains by pursuing legal recognition of their community land and water resources. Two communities celebrated success in 2018, and at least 12 more claims are in process.

Tribal land appropriation

Many tribal landowners leased or sold parcels of land to Agumil. Those who leased said they were provided loans from the government-run Land Bank of the Philippines, negotiated by Agumil, to clear the land and plant oil palm saplings. Title deeds to the leased land were lodged with the bank as collateral against the loans, where they remain.

“Until now I am riding only in my thongs,” said Mily Saya, landowner and member of the village cooperative in the barangay of Aramaywan. He explains how early company promises of a car and stone house failed to materialize. He says he “has no idea how to get back the land title” for his 4.7 hectares (11.6 acres) from the Land Bank.

“I don’t know how big the loan is from the Land Bank,” he says, explaining how the company planted oil palm seedlings on 1 hectare (2.5 acres) of his land but abandoned the rest with no explanation.

In time, the saplings matured and today the plantations are producing plentiful bunches of oil palm fruit. Still, members of the landowner cooperatives say they have yet to see any financial returns on their leased land. The problem all cite is that the loans came with crippling 14 percent annual interest rates, which left the original loan amounts inflating out of control. The terms of the lease contracts also stipulate that ongoing operational and managements costs be subtracted from the loan and harvest income.

“You will become a rich man,” Larry Arcuyo says he and other landowners were promised, “before entering into contracts” with Agumil. Arcuyo chairs the Aramaywan farmers’ cooperative, one of 14 such growers’ cooperatives on the island. He says Aramaywan has 26 members who have leased land to Agumil. “There are rich men in Palawan — rich of debt,” he says. “We are praying that someone helps us to resolve that problem.

“From the start almost 11 years [ago], the landowners have never seen any money even through the harvesting started eight years ago … Some landowners already died in the meantime,” Arcuyo says. He adds that the price per kilo of palm fruit set by Agumil “is already very low.” Even then, he says, this payment never reaches the farmers who have leased their land to the company; instead, “it is given to the Land Bank for settling the debt,” including for preparation of the land and the initial seedlings. “All decisions regarding finances are controlled by the company,” Arcuyo says.

According to the Coalition against Land Grabbing (CALG), a local indigenous organization campaigning for indigenous people’s rights, 9,000 hectares (22,200 acres) in Palawan have been cleared for oil palm plantations, and the government is inviting foreign investors to develop more. Agumil spokesman Eric Ang told Mongabay, “We intend to expand our business in the oil palm industry but for now we are consolidating in Palawan.”

CALG says that if rules and regulations had been implemented properly, Agumil would never have been able to develop its plantations in the first place. It claims the Philippines’ Indigenous Peoples’ Rights Act (IPRA Law) has been ignored, and that the Palawan Council for Sustainable Development (PCSD) has failed to implement its Strategic Environmental Plan as required under a 1992 act. The group also says that environmental compliance certificates should never have been issued to palm oil companies by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources. The department did not respond to an email request to comment from Mongabay.

Arbitration between tribes and company

The Palawan Palm Oil Industry Development Council (PPOIDC), a multi-stakeholder industry body, is seeking a solution to the ongoing disagreements. However, four meetings “resulted in deadlock,” according to the minutes of the most recent meeting, held last November, and an agreement has still not been reached.

According to lease agreements obtained by Mongabay, Agumil offered a land rental rate of 17,000 pesos ($333) per hectare for a 10-year period, amounting to 1,000 to 2,000 pesos ($20 to $40) per hectare per year to each landowner. In addition, it offered 200 pesos ($4) per ton for harvested palm fruit.

The price of processed palm oil has been dropping in recent months, and on May 31 stood at $563 per metric ton, the sixth-lowest monthly valuation in the past five years.

It was noted at the PPOIDC meeting that the estimated tonnage of palm oil per hectare was well below that promised to farmers by Agumil at the project initiation. In contrast, the palm oil cooperatives demanded a signing bonus of 20,000 pesos ($400), production sharing of 400 pesos ($8) per metric ton, and land lease rental of 10,000 pesos ($200) per hectare per year.

The meeting recommended that Agumil reconsider its offer to the cooperatives and if still no agreement could be reached, the committee should “render a report to the committee on Cooperatives, House of Representatives, and recommend/request Congress to provide legal assistance to the Palm Oil Cooperatives for the filing of appropriate case, a class suit against Agumil.”

It also recommended that the “Top management of the Landbank of the Philippines conduct a thorough investigation on the various accounts of the Oil Palm Cooperatives and possibly cooperate with the Oil Palm Cooperatives in filing appropriate legal charges against Agumil.”

Back in 2015, only one co-op had already repaid its loan and four were up-to-date with payments and on course for full repayment by 2023. Seven, however, needed loan restructuring and two had defaulted on their repayments. Restructuring in previous meetings had involved interest rate reductions from 14 percent to 7 percent, and the management fee charged by Agumil reduced from 10 percent to between 2.5 and 5 percent.

Summing up, board member B.M. Rama said that, “with what had happened to this industry, somebody must be [held] responsible and liable to this problem and that this case should be brought to the proper forum which is the court.”

Asked by Mongabay whether Agumil would be improving terms to co-ops in future, Ang said: “There is no change in the terms and conditions of the Lease Agreement entered between the Coops and the Company.” He maintained that the coops are still liable for a start-up 20 percent equity advance, a matter hotly disputed in the meeting. “We are agreeable to an independent audit of the 20 percent equity advance,” Ang said, adding that none of the co-ops had yet initiated the auditing process.

The idea that the capital debt of the co-ops be assumed by another entity was recommended by a study commissioned by the government’s Cooperative Development Authority. Ang says this “was explored by the Land Bank of Philippines (LBP) and Agumil.” Such a restructuring scheme has yet to be implemented, and according to Ang, would entail a new company assuming the capital debt and a further loan from the Land Bank along with a “processing agreement with Agumil.”

Moratoria stop palm oil plantations

These days, the tribes are getting organized and pursuing ways to seek justice for their lost earnings. Mobilizing to stem the spread of oil palm plantations in Palawan, groups such as CALG have networked with Palawan’s tribal groups to explain the risks of leasing their land. According to CALG chairman Kemil Motalib, the lessons have been learned and nobody is leasing land to Agumil any longer, though some are selling plots in areas where cultivation is still permitted.

There’s another cause for celebration among Palawan’s indigenous communities: the planting of oil palm has been banned in two other provinces in the Philippines, a trend others may follow in the coming months.

“No to expansion of palm oil planting in Rizal for five years,” says Motalib, explaining the substance of the moratorium declared by the Rizal municipal government in October 2018. Motalib, who is from the Tagbanwa tribe, said that a year of painstaking lobbying that included frequent meetings with government officials by CALG members and local indigenous people had finally paid off: “After one year the moratorium was signed by the Municipal Mayor of Rizal,” he says. “Agumil cannot question it because that is ordinance. That is the law made by the municipal government.”

This sense of victory was reinforced by the election of Rizal’s first indigenous mayor. Otol Odi, a member of the Palaw’an tribe, was won the May 13 election, polling nearly twice his nearest rival. Odi, now in his seventies, attracted widespread support among Rizal’s population of 50,000 with his platform of defending the area’s natural resources from big business.

The municipality of Quezon was the first in the Philippines to declare a moratorium on oil palm cultivation, back in 2014. After recent victories, CALG is now pressing for similar moves in the municipalities of Española and Bataraza. When asked by Mongabay whether Agumil would respect the moratoria, Ang said, “We will abide by any rules and regulations imposed by the Government.”

A further challenge to palm oil companies came from the May 16 re-election of Mary Jean Feliciano as mayor of Brooke’s Point. Despite Agumil being headquartered at Maasin near Brooke’s Point, where its processing plant is located, and using the town’s port facilities for exporting palm oil, Mayor Feliciano has pledged no new oil palm plantations in her region. (She says the two existing plantations can stay for now.) When asked what impact this would have on Agumil’s business, Ang said the company was “not aware of Mayor Feliciano’s pledge.”

Recognizing ancestral domain land

In an August 2018 ceremony, ancestral domain titles were awarded to the Tagbanwa tribes in the barangays of Berong and Aramaywan. In all, the titles awarded by the National Commission on Indigenous People (NCIP) covered 31,000 hectares (76,600 acres) of territory, comprising 23,000 hectares (56,800 acres) of land and 8,000 hectares (19,800 acres) of ancestral waters.

“The forest land is inside the ancestral domain because the forest provides many things, such as honey, rattan, and almaciga [Agathis philippinensis] tree resin,” says Sarong resident Romeo Japson. “They are hunting grounds and provide clean water to drink. There are also natural medicines in the forest that can prevent and cure many illnesses.”

After an application has been filed, it is assessed by the NCIP at the national office in Manila. Here the order is issued for a survey of the area to determine parcel size and boundaries.

“Ancestral domain land is the common land of the indigenous peoples. So the indigenous people are claiming their land, no limits to the thousands of hectares that they claimed. They can own that but only communally, not in the name of one person,” Japson says. He adds that marine and mangrove areas can also be applied for under ancestral domain.

However, there are hurdles. According to Motalib, it takes at least five years to process an application, with the domains granted to Berong and Aramaywan the result of “12 years hard work.” Part of this is due to the average cost per application of around 1 million pesos ($19,500), which can take a while to amass. Then there’s the issue of capacity.

“The NCIP is very stretched as there is only one office in the whole of Palawan and only a few staff,” Motalib says.

Despite the obstacles, the number of ancestral domain applications has grown, with 12 currently in the pipeline. CALG has an ambitious program in the works that intends to support three barangays each in the municipalities of Batarazza and Matarazza and six in Quezon, according to Motalib.

After years of struggling against the odds for the rights to their land, the indigenous peoples of Palawan appear to be making progress.

“Ancestral domain is the only way the Katutubo [indigenous peoples] can protect their rights, their land,” Japson says. “It will decide whether they live freely and whether they maintain their own traditions and culture.

“Indigenous people believe if there is a forest, there is food, there is medicine, there is everything else.”

Published by Mongabay.com

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  • Palawan palm oil_02
    Palm oil tramples indigenous people's rights.
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    Palm oil kernel harvested from a plantation in Aramaywan community awaits transport to the Agumil processing plant.
  • An indigenous community member from Aramaywan village, Palawan.
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    Palm oil fruit harvested from a plantation in Aramaywan community awaits transport to the Agumil processing plant.
  • Palawan palm oil_05
    Mily Saya Landowner and member of the Aramaywan cooperative, leased most of his land to Agumil but has yet to realise any return.
  • A resident of Arawaywan community at home.
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    A palm oil transport truck broken down at a palm oil plantation near Espanyola, Palawan
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    Palm oil kernel awaiting transportation to the Agumil processing plant near Brookes Point.
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    Workers load bunches of palm oil fruit onto a truck bound for the Agumil processing plant at Brookes Point, Palawan.
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  • A tribal elders from Sarong community chatting in Southern Palawan.
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    Sarong community members chatting on the porch of a village house, in Southern Palawan.
  • Palawan palm oil_12
    Villagers from Sarong community in the far South of Palawan, discuss the loss of their ancestral forest which was taken for a palm oil plantation.
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    A fighting cock on a perch on the windy beach at Brookes Point where palm oil is shipped from.
  • A boy plays with a home made boat in Brooks Point harbour.
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    Youth and children from Brookes Point hang out on a shipping buoy at the edge of the harbour where palm oil is exported.
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    Youth and children from Brookes Point hang out on a shipping buoy at the edge of the harbour where palm oil is exported.
  • Children playing on a fishing boat in Sabang village, Palawan.
  • Children playing on the waterside at sunset in Sabang village, Palawan.
  • Children playing on the waterside at sunset in Sabang village, Palawan.

An Indonesian forest community grapples with the arrival of the outside world

  • Globally recognized for its outstanding biodiversity and unique cultural heritage, the Mentawai Archipelago’s Siberut Island is under increasing pressure
  • Siberut Island, part of the Mentawai archipelago in western Indonesia, is recognized as a U.N. Biosphere Reserve due to its outstanding cultural and ecological value.
  • The traditions of the indigenous Mentawai people, including agroforestry and customary land tenure, have allowed the people of the island live off the forest without depleting it.
  • Roughly half of the island is protected as a national park. The rest, however, has been parceled out for timber and biomass plantations, road building, and the development of a special economic zone including a yacht marina and luxury resort.

DOROGOT, Indonesia — Toikot rises as the golden light of dawn begins to shine on the heavy mist that cloaks the rainforest canopy outside his home in Indonesia’s Siberut Island. The pigs leave their sleeping place under his traditional uma clan house and set out to forage in the forest. Later they will return to the farmstead to eat sago.

An elderly indigenous Mentawai traditional healer, or sekerei, Toikot’s first task of the day is to gather “something beautiful from nature” with which to adorn himself. Today he plucks two red flowers and places one behind each ear. A loincloth, elaborate tattoos and headdress complete the distinctive customary dress for which the sekerei are known.

Toikot’s home, the farming community of Dorogot, is a cluster of forest farmsteads on the eastern side of Siberut, around three hours’ walk from the nearest village, mostly through arduous lowland swamp forest.

Siberut is the largest island in the Mentawai archipelago, which lies 140 kilometers (87 miles) west of the Indonesian island of Sumatra. The rainforest-swathed island has been isolated from the rest of Indonesia for half a million years, leading to an unusually high level of endemism. Two-thirds of the animals here are thought to be unique to the island.

This unique biological and cultural diversity was recognized in 1981 when UNESCO designated the island a Biosphere Reserve. This was consolidated in 1993 when Indonesia’s Ministry of Forestry established Siberut National Park, spanning 1,905 square kilometers (736 square miles) and covering most of the island’s western half.

Now, though, both Siberut’s traditional lifestyles and its biodiversity are under pressure from a spate of development projects. While the western half of the island is largely protected, the northeast is already home to a sizable timber concession and a biomass forestry concession. The central government also has big plans to develop a special economic zone in the south, and a highway linking it to the forest concessions in the north. The local government and a private company also plan to bring electricity to villages via a biomass project.

Land ownership and logging

These development plans are already coming into conflict with indigenous traditions in Siberut.

Mentawai ownership patterns are complex, relying on ancestral history passed orally from one generation to the next. Land tenure is deeply entwined with extended family clan kinship patterns, which create ties between the indigenous Mentawai people. “A land certificate is not so important as here we don’t sell the land. We know the story about the land, so that’s like a certificate,” says Fransiskus Samapoupou from Madobag village, echoing a widely held view on land ownership among the Mentawai. A candidate for a major political party in recent elections, he made land rights one of his key campaign issues. (Final election results are still not in, but Fransiskus’s name doesn’t appear among the winners in an unofficial tally.)

These sophisticated land ownership patterns, however, are not generally recognized by the government, since they rely on oral tradition rather than state-issued paper titles. As a result, the government claims ownership of most Siberut lands, and has allocated huge chunks to big development projects.

The government has since 1969 used its claim over the land to award forestry and logging concessions in the Mentawai Islands. The current logging operator is a Sumatra-based firm, PT Salaki Summa Sejahtera, which was in 2004 awarded a 45-year, 47,605-hectare (117,635-acre) timber concession covering the northeastern part of the island. Only a narrow buffer zone separates the logging concession and the national park. As of 2016, the company’s annual extraction target was 64,000 cubic meters (2.26 million cubic feet) of timber, focused on valuable species such as meranti, keruing and nyato mersawa.

Activists say that logging has brought few benefits, and many hardships, to the community. “The economic situation of the community has not improved. Our investigation shows that some of the company’s social obligations are not carried out,” says Rifai Lubis, director of the NGO Citra Mandiri Mentawai Foundation (YCMM).

As of 2011, the company was working with the Borneo Initiative, a forestry certification platform, to achieve a certificate of sustainable forest management. However, NGOs including YCMM have blamed the logging operations for increased incidence of flooding in the concession areas in recent years. “Logging carried out by this company must be one of the causes of flood event,” says Lubis. “The occurrence of flooding is increasingly common, and the volume of water during floods is also increasing.” These floods damage crops and have even washed away houses, he says.

Biomass plantations

In Siberut’s central eastern area, a company called PT Biomass Andalan Energi (BAE) was in 2015 granted a 20,030–hectare (49,500-acre), 36-year concession to cut down rainforest and replace it with fast-growing exotic tree species for export as feedstock to be burned to generate biomass energy. Most of this concession abuts the national park. According to plans, three main species are due to be planted: kaliandra (Calliandra calothyrsus), gamal (Gliricidia sepium) and lamtoro (Leucaena leucocephala). Maps show a network of service roads due to be constructed on the concession.

“These invasive trees species grow easily and can displace native species. It is feared that they could disturb the trees and biodiversity of Siberut National Park,” Lubis says. YCMM has launched a petition against the project as part of ongoing advocacy efforts, which in 2016 saw local protests against the project on the island. In 2017 the district government reacted by recognizing traditional rights as a step toward granting customary forest status.

The YCMM petition, which calls on Indonesia’s president to revoke PT BAE’s permit, alleges that the biomass company acquired the permit without obtaining the consent of the local indigenous people, and that letters and petitions from tribal councils and Mentawai environmentalists, submitted in 2017, were ignored.

A previous petition to stop the company by Rainforest Rescue ended in May 2018 after drawing 245,576 signatures.

New road project

“I walk to Madobag once a week to see my grandson,” says Toikot.

His grandson, like many high school students, lives away from home because the arduous six-hour round trip makes a daily commute impossible. To market their farm produce, people living in the interior often make the longer and more expensive journey to the market at Muara or the port at Maillepet by motorized dugout canoe. Even so, Toikot is against the prospect of new roads in the area. “A road might make it easier to walk, but there would be more accidents with cars and motorbikes,” he says. “People’s chickens would get run over.”

A muddy walking trail is all that links the school village of Madobag to the outside world for now. But the route is set for a major upgrade. Work is already underway to build the Trans-Mentawai highway, a two-lane paved road running north-south along the eastern half of Siberut Island, with transport links to neighboring islands, passing through the villages of Rogdog, Madobag and Matotonan along the way.

As of April, only one river bridge and a few miles of paved road had been completed, in the Muara area, an hour by motorized canoe downstream from Dorogot. A second river bridge now nearing completion has taken eight months to build and abruptly stops on the south bank, where dense forest remains. A worker on the project told Mongabay he had been working on it for six to seven months, earning the equivalent of $5.70 per day.

“A big road would be good, but if it means cutting down my areca nut trees, the government must pay,” says Aman Derik Ogo, an elderly man at a trailside coffee shop in Mangaroot village, just beyond the current end of the paved road.

On the track towards Madobag, Kornelius Sakaliou disappears from the path and slashes weeds at the base of a huge durian tree towering some 20 meters (60 feet) high. “I inherited this durian tree from my grandfather who planted it years ago,” Sakaliou says. He adds he’s horrified that widening the track into a road could condemn his durian tree, and he’s not alone.

“The government must ask who the land and trees belong to,” says local politician Fransiskus. “I want people to get money for their land and money for their durian trees.” That he’s put this issue at the top of his agenda reflects the widespread concern here about compensation for land and property requisition.

Coastal development

Life in the forest contrasts starkly with plans by the district government to establish a special economic zone on the south coast. Key to this project is the Mentawai Bay Resort, a 2,639-hectare (6,521-acre) coastal development, for which Java-based firm PT Putra Mahakarya Sentosa was awarded a contract. According to the company’s plans, the resort will stretch across about 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) of beachfront and extend up to 6 kilometers (3.7 miles) inland, into what is currently a traditional farming area full of multi-cropped agroforestry gardens among the forest. The area that will be swallowed up by the project also includes a freshwater lake on which people rely for fishing, particularly during the stormy rainy season when rough seas make it dangerous for fishing boats.

The first phase of construction will focus on a 300-hectare (741-acre) airport, an adjacent harbor and yacht marina, hotels, and a theme park. In all, five beachfront hotels, villas and condominium towers will take up 900 hectares (2,224 acres). A golf course, zoo, eco-theme park, hospital, college, and industrial center are also planned. A spiritual area and cultural village are included in recognition of Siberut’s unique cultural heritage.

When it comes to recognition of land rights, however, the developers are lagging behind, says Lubis of the YCMM. “There is compensation given, but only for coconut palms. Whereas land is not compensated.” Lubis says the compensation varies depending on the number or coconut palms lost, and is paid out on an annual basis for five years. Local farmers are still holding out for a comprehensive compensation package that recognizes other assets such as fruit trees, and for now construction remains deadlocked.

Biomass electricity

In addition to these large, state-backed initiatives, projects at the local level are already having an impact. In March 2017, work commenced on a biomass power plant, developed by Jakarta-based PT Charta Putra Indonesia (CPI). According to its project portfolio, the company has plans to generate power from tourist trash in Bali and establish a biomass plant in Jambi, on the Sumatra mainland. The Mentawai Distributed Power project is the company’s flagship, a $12.4 million project financed by international donors including the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), via the Indonesian government-administered Millennium Challenge Account (MCA).

In a 2018 presentation, founding director Jaya Wahono described biomass energy as a way to make use of the 20 million hectares [49 million acres] of degraded and marginalized lands in Indonesia. By harvesting just two to three bamboo poles per month, he said, households can meet their energy needs.

In the villages of Rogdog and Madobag, electricity meters freshly installed on the porch of each house remain a mystery to many people. In particular, people are unclear how the new electricity they have been receiving for the past year will be paid for.

“I don’t have an agreement with the company yet. They just gave me a hundred bamboo saplings to plant and 100,000 rupiah [$7] as payment for planting them,” says clan leader Aman Patdoini in Rogdog.

Wahono anticipates that after five years of growth, each seedling will yield 100 poles, equal to around 200 to 300 tons of bamboo feedstock per household. If that proves correct, the 200 households in Rogdog village would produce up to 60,000 tons of bamboo feedstock in five years, more than enough to cover the 2,555 tons required annually to fuel the plant at seven tons per day.

These estimates may be optimistic: instead of the monocrop plantation depicted in the company’s marketing materials, seedlings planted in one garden visited by Mongabay were interspersed among other crops, as is customary on the island. Several farmers also said that because they keep pigs they had given their seedlings to neighbors and helped plant them.

But most hope the sale of bamboo will be enough to cover their electricity bill. “It’s undecided whether they’ll have to pay for electricity,” says Gervasius Tasiriottoi of Rogdog village, who is in charge of keeping population records for the local government. “Maybe they can give harvested bamboo in exchange,” he speculates.

“For now, while staff training takes place, the generator is being run on gasoline. It will be switched to wood in a few months’ time,” says Tasiriottoi. The bamboo harvest is still several years away, though. “In the meantime the company are offering 300 rupiah per kilo [less than a cent per pound] for wood,” says Tasiriottoi. At the entrance to the 300-kilowatt power plant is a pile of logs gathered locally.

“There is plenty of wood, so for now they’re not cutting trees,” Tasiriottoi says. However not all agree, and there’s widespread concern about the impact the project could have on the remaining forest in the area. “There will be a four-year wait until the first bamboo harvest, so I worry the jungle will be destroyed because there is not enough wood. Wild pigs and monkeys will be affected,” says Aman Patdoini.

“Electricity is good, but if the company plant in my garden there will be problems,” says Aman Derik Ogo. “This is our land. Even for me I’m old already. If they grow bamboo everywhere, where can a person find their livelihood? No trees anymore, no medicine, no food. Water all gone. No more firewood. Nothing, because everything used in the biomass plant. No trees anymore so Mentawai people will die.”

An island at the crossroads

The Mentawai are a tight-knit tribe proud of their cultural heritage. Their forest-dependent customary beliefs and livelihood traditions have proven resilient over the ages, allowing them to live off the land without depleting it. Now, development projects are attracting a mixed reception from the Mentawai. While some benefits like electricity and transportation are broadly welcomed, concerns and suspicions about the negative impacts of development are widespread, and opposition is growing to projects that threaten the forest and cultivated gardens.

Back in Dorogot, life remains much as it has been for generations. To the untrained eye the multi-crop forest garden, where natural forest has grown around cultivated trees, could easily be mistaken for dense jungle. As the sun sinks in the sky and the pigs amble back in search of sago feed, Toikot leaps to his feet with a start. “Can you hear that eagle?” he exclaims. “It’s after my chicks.” The ambitious development plans about to take shape nearby seem distant for now, but for how much longer?
Citation:

Meyers, K., Pio, D., Rachmania, S., Hernandez, A. (2006) 25 Years of Siberut Biosphere Reserve: Saving Siberut and Its Unique Culture and Natural Heritage. UNESCO, Jakarta, Indonesia.

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    Toikot (right) is a traditional shaman healer here speaking to his Grandson inside his traditional Uma house. Siberut Island, part of the Mentawai archipelago in western Indonesia, is recognized as a U.N. Biosphere Reserve due to its outstanding cultural and ecological value.
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    Toikot is a traditional shaman healer with his animals inside his traditional Uma house. Siberut Island, part of the Mentawai archipelago in western Indonesia, is recognized as a U.N. Biosphere Reserve due to its outstanding cultural and ecological value.
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    Skulls of hunted monkeys, hornbill and pigs hang from the rafters in an Uma clan house in Dorogot hamlet. Many Mentawai people still follow an old animist belief system of which this decoration is a part.
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    A Mentawai woman bathes her baby in a traditional Uma clan house in Dorogot hamlet. Siberut Island, part of the Mentawai archipelago in western Indonesia, is recognized as a U.N. Biosphere Reserve due to its outstanding cultural and ecological value.
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    Head of the clan, an elderly Mentawai 'Sekerei' shaman sits on the porth of his uma clan house in Dorogot hamlet.
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    Kornelius lights a paraffin lamp in the traditional Uma clan house in Dorogot hamlet, an isolated community in Siberut's swamp forest. Electricity has yet to reach Dorogot, but is already being rolled out in neighbouring villages Rogdog and Madobag as part of a Biomass generation scheme.
  • Siberut Island_08
    Toikot is a traditional 'sekerei' shaman and here sits cutting wild mushrooms gathered from the forest in his traditional uma house. Above him hang animist hunting tokens.
  • Siberut Island_09
    Toikot and his grandson eat sago which has been baked in green bamboo stems. Sago is the staple carbohydrate on which the tribespeople depend. It is extracted from sago palm cut in the forest.
  • Siberut Island_10
    Toikot looks out from his uma house across the forest where he lives in Dorogot hamlet. A traditional Sekerei shaman, the flowers behind his ears comprise part of his traditional dress.
  • Siberut Island_11
    Mentawai tribesmen sit in the traditional uma clan house in Dorogot hamlet discussing the upcoming hunting expedition. Siberut Island, part of the Mentawai archipelago in western Indonesia, is recognized as a U.N. Biosphere Reserve due to its outstanding cultural and ecological value.
  • Siberut Island_12
    Toikot shaves the woody sago heart into a course flour using his machete. He will then pack it into fresh bamboo stems and roast them over the fire. He is a traditional healer 'Sekerei' as denoted by his tattoos and customary dress.
  • Siberut Island_13
    Toikot, a traditional Mentawai shaman or 'Sekerei' at home in Dorogot hamlet.
  • Siberut Island_14
    Toikot, a traditional Mentwai 'sekerei' shaman, looks over to his pig stye to check on his pigs which are feedling on sago logs.
  • Siberut Island_15
    Toikot looks out over the forest from his traditional Uma clan house in Durogot hamlet. He is a traditional healer 'Sekerei' as denoted by his tattoos and dress.
  • Siberut Island_16
    A mentawai man in Dorogot hamlet eats a sago grub, a traditional source of protein. Siberut Island, part of the Mentawai archipelago in western Indonesia, is recognized as a U.N. Biosphere Reserve due to its outstanding cultural and ecological value.
  • Siberut Island_17
    A Mentawai tribesman on motorbike fords a river on the only trail connecting Madobag village with the coast. There are few vehicles, and most people walk.
  • Siberut Island_18
    Three Mentawai men walk out of a traditional Uma clan house in Madobag village. The path in front of the house is slated to be widened and paved into a two lane road to form part of the Trans-Mentawai highway project.
  • Siberut Island_19
    A mentawai man carries a pig in Madobag village. Pig farming is traditionally the main form of animal husbandry, in contrast to the Muslim majority of the population for whom pork is not allowed.
  • Siberut Island_20
    Two elderly Mentawai tribesmen compare tattos in Madobag village. Siberut Island, part of the Mentawai archipelago in western Indonesia, is recognized as a U.N. Biosphere Reserve due to its outstanding cultural and ecological value.
  • Siberut Island_21
    A woman cuts open a fresh cacao fruit to feed to her son on a porch in Madobag village.
  • Siberut Island_22
    An elderly Mentawai tribesman site on a porch in Madobag village. Siberut Island, part of the Mentawai archipelago in western Indonesia, is recognized as a U.N. Biosphere Reserve due to its outstanding cultural and ecological value.
  • Siberut Island_23
    A man in Durogot hamlet prepares a dugout canoe. He says it takes him two weeks to make a dugout canoe which is made from a single tree. They are a popular source of transport through the forest, especially for taking produce like cocoa, banana, cloves and sago to coastal...
  • Siberut Island_24
    Islanders take a motorised twon to market at Muara town downstream. Siberut Island, part of the Mentawai archipelago in western Indonesia, is recognized as a U.N. Biosphere Reserve due to its outstanding cultural and ecological value.
  • Siberut Island_25
    Men sit on the porch of a roadside house which has lost its garden due to road building as part of the trans-Mentawai highway project in Muara town, Siberut island.
  • Siberut Island_26
    A newly constructed road bridge in Muara town is part of the trans-mentawai road building programme.
  • Siberut Island_27
    A boy jumps from a new road bridge constructed across the river outside Muara town. The bridge is part of the Trans-Mentawai highway project which plans to run the length of the island and beyond to other islands in the archipelago.
  • Siberut Island_28
    Construction of the trans-Mentawai highway in town of Muara.
  • Siberut Island_29
    A boy site on a digger outside Muara town, during construction of the trans-Mentawai highway.
  • Siberut Island_30
    A man holds sago flour dough at a small processing factory where sago palm is processed into sago flour.
Continue reading An Indonesian forest community grapples with the arrival of the outside world

Stateless children of Borneo

A boy paddles using his shoes in an upturned aluminium washing-up bowl he is using as a boat offshore from Gaya Isand, Sabah, East-Malaysia. He is one of thousands of stateless people on Gaya island, mainly from the Bajau Laut community of sea-gypsies and immigrants from the Sulu area of The Philippines.

Thousands of undocumented immigrants live in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some have lived there for many years and have families. Not eligible for official documentation they are stateless people. Lacking official recognition, children cannot attend state school and many end up with no education working in menial jobs. Others are exploited by traffickers. Many are Bajau sea-gypsies, others are immigrants from the Muslim Sulu area of Southern Philippines. Indonesian workers also come across the porous border from Kalimantan seeking work.

Many of the Bajau Laut sea gypsies have now settled in Sabah. Climate change, overfishing and poverty have caused them to give up their nomadic life on the sea in favour of the shanty towns of coastal Sabah. The presence of migrants has been tolerated because many are contributing work in the state. However in recent years a rise in Muslim terrorist activity at tourist resorts around the coast has made the government less tolerant towards the migrants and less inclined to provide residency papers. So these shanty communities remain in limbo, trapped in an insecure situation where they cannot progress.

This story follows children from the shanty villages of Gaya Island, offshore from capital Kota Kinabalu, as they fight, play and hustle for a living in the capital’s busy fish docks and markets.

  • Stateless_Sabah01
    A boatman climbs into his boat beneath a shanty village built over the water offshore from Gaya island. Thousands of undocumented immigrants live in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some of them have lived there for many years and have children. Not eligible for official documentation they are stateless...
  • Stateless_Sabah02
    Children look out from a mosque in the shanty village of Gaya island.
  • Stateless_Sabah03
    A boy paddles using his shoes in an upturned aluminium washing-up bowl he is using as a boat offshore from Gaya Isand, Sabah, East-Malaysia. He is one of thousands of stateless people on Gaya island, mainly from the Bajau Laut community of sea-gypsies and immigrants from the Sulu area of...
  • Stateless_Sabah04
    Thousands of undocumented immigrants live in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some of them have lived there for many years and have children. Not eligible for official documentation they are stateless people. Lacking official recognition, children cannot attend state school and many end up with no education working in...
  • Stateless_Sabah05
    A boy leaps of a rickety walkway outside his shanty home into the sea below. Sprawling shanty villages have grown up around Gaya island offshore from the capital Kota Kinabalu.
  • Stateless_Sabah06
    A boy walks through discarded garbage covering the beach at his shanty village of houses on stilts roughly built over the water on Gaya Island, offshore from the State capital of Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, East Malaysia. Like thousands of others, he has no formal immigration status and is considered ‘stateless’....
  • Stateless_Sabah07
    People await the taxiboat off Gaya island to take them to the capital Kota Kinabalu in the background.
  • Stateless_Sabah08
    Thousands of undocumented immigrants live in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some of them have lived there for many years and have children. Not eligible for official documentation they are stateless people. Lacking official recognition, children cannot attend state school and many end up with no education working in...
  • Stateless_Sabah09
    The Filipino fish docks in Kota Kinabalu are a hive of activity where fish are landed from Filipino trawlers, many of which have been out to sea for weeks at a time. The fishermen are among thousands of undocumented immigrants living in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some of...
  • Stateless_Sabah10
    Fish cover the Filipino fish dock having been unloaded from the hold of a trawler. The trawler had been at sea for 30 days. The different species of fish are separated into boxes, labelled, weighed and loaded onto vehicles for distribution from Kota Kinabalu the capital of Sabah, East Malaysia.
  • Stateless_Sabah11
    A boy who has just been hit looks enviously at another boy who is holding a handful of fish. Stateless, these Bajau Laut sea-gypsy boys cannot go to school. Instead they loiter around the fish dock pretending to work and scrounging or stealing fish which they will then try to...
  • Stateless_Sabah12
    A Filipino dock worker sorts different species of fish into separate boxes as they are unloaded from trawlers at the Filipino fish dock in Kota Kinabalu the capital of Sabah, East Malaysia.
  • Stateless_Sabah13
    This boy is getting bullied by the older boys at the Filipino ship dock, some of whom now work there. The Filipino fish docks in Kota Kinabalu are a hive of activity where fish are landed from Filipino trawlers, many of which have been out to sea for weeks at...
  • Stateless_Sabah14
    The Filipino fish docks in Kota Kinabalu are a hive of activity where fish are landed from Filipino trawlers, many of which have been out to sea for weeks at a time. The fishermen are among thousands of undocumented immigrants living in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some of...
  • Stateless_Sabah15
    The Filipino fish docks in Kota Kinabalu are a hive of activity where fish are landed from Filipino trawlers, many of which have been out to sea for weeks at a time. The fishermen are among thousands of undocumented immigrants living in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some of...
  • Stateless_Sabah16
    Trawler fishermen unload their catch onto the dockside having been at sea for a month. The Filipino fish docks in Kota Kinabalu are a hive of activity where fish are landed from Filipino trawlers, many of which have been out to sea for weeks at a time. The fishermen are...
  • Stateless_Sabah17
    A boy plays in an icebox on the dockside in Kota Kinabalu.
  • Stateless_Sabah18
    Masked trawler men unload their catch.
  • Stateless_Sabah19
    The Filipino fish docks in Kota Kinabalu are a hive of activity where fish are landed from Filipino trawlers, many of which have been out to sea for weeks at a time. The fishermen are among thousands of undocumented immigrants living in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some of...
  • Stateless_Sabah20
    A boy stands on the edge of a garbage skip at the entrance to the Filipino market in Kota Kinabalu. With no immigration documentation, he and the other children in the picture are classed as ‘Stateless’ and cannot go to school. Instead they start work at an early age as...
  • Stateless_Sabah21
    The hair of the boy to the right has a nutrient deficiency common among immigrant street kids.
  • Stateless_Sabah22
    Stateless street children loiter around the Filipino market in Koto Kinabalu, getting up to mischief and searching for menial work as porters and bag carriers. Tens of thousands of undocumented immigrants live in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some of them have lived there for many years with children...
  • Stateless_Sabah23
    A boy points at another boy among a groups standing on porter trolleys and watching the sunset. Every evening ‘stateless’ children gather at the Filipino market in the town centre, where they work as porters because they are not eligible to join the state school education system. Kota Kinabalu, Sabah.
  • Stateless_Sabah24
    Stateless street children loiter around the Filipino market in Koto Kinabalu, getting up to mischief and searching for menial work as porters and bag carriers. Tens of thousands of undocumented immigrants live in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some of them have lived there for many years with children...
  • Stateless_Sabah25
    A trawler off the coast of Kota Kinabalu at sunset.
  • Stateless_Sabah26
    Stateless street children self-study at dusk outside the Filipino market in Koto Kinabalu. Tens of thousands of undocumented immigrants live in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some of them have lived there for many years with children born there. Not eligible for official documentation they are stateless people. Lacking...
  • Stateless_Sabah27
    A fishwoman displays her fresh fish in the Filipino market in Sabah.
  • Stateless_Sabah28
    Market stallholders at their fish stall in the Filipino market.
  • Stateless_Sabah29
    A boy sits on an icebox at dusk among the junk and garbage at the back of the Filipino market. Stateless street children loiter around the Filipino market in Koto Kinabalu, getting up to mischief and searching for menial work as porters and bag carriers. Tens of thousands of undocumented...
  • Stateless_Sabah30
    A boy in the Filipino market receives a coin from a customer for his services of providing a plastic bag for fish which he will then carry for his customer. Thousands of undocumented migrants live in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some of them have lived there for many...
  • Stateless_Sabah31
    Children play fighting at night outside the Filipino market. Stateless street children loiter around the Filipino market in Koto Kinabalu, getting up to mischief and searching for menial work as porters and bag carriers. Tens of thousands of undocumented immigrants live in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some of...
  • Stateless_Sabah32
    Two undocumented migrant sisters hustle for customers in the Filipino market in Sabah state capital Kota Kinabalu.
  • Stateless_Sabah33
    Two girls await payment for a plastic bag in the Filipino market in Kota Kinabalu.
  • Stateless_Sabah34
    A girl is caught red handed stealing sate chicken in the Filipino market. Stateless street children loiter around the Filipino market in Koto Kinabalu, getting up to mischief and searching for menial work as porters and bag carriers. Tens of thousands of undocumented immigrants live in Sabah, East Malaysia on...
  • Stateless_Sabah35
    Sate stalls at the Filipino market in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah's capital.
  • Stateless_Sabah36
    Stateless street children loiter around the Filipino market in Koto Kinabalu, getting up to mischief and searching for menial work as porters and bag carriers. Tens of thousands of undocumented immigrants live in Sabah, East Malaysia on Borneo Island. Some of them have lived there for many years with children...
  • Stateless_Sabah37
    A boy plays in the Filipino market with a plastic bag over his head. Having received no school education he is unaware of the dangers of suffocation. Stateless street children loiter around the Filipino market in Koto Kinabalu, getting up to mischief and searching for menial work as porters and...
  • Stateless_Sabah38
    Two boys play a favourite game of 'coin' outside a public toilet in Kota Kinabalu, capital of Sabah. Stateless street children loiter around the Filipino market, getting up to mischief and searching for menial work as porters and bag carriers. Tens of thousands of undocumented immigrants live in Sabah, East...

Communities struggle to save Sabah’s shrinking mangroves

Mastupang Bin Somoi, 52, from Kampung Sungai Eloi stands in front of an area of mangrove forest which has been killed off for clearance through unknown means. The authority for clearing the area is contested because at the time the company responsible did not have the required environmental impact assessment.
  • A development plan establishing shrimp farms and timber plantations begun purportedly to reduce poverty in northern Sabah, Malaysia, has attracted criticism from local communities and NGOs, which say the project is ignoring communities’ land rights.
  • Satellite imagery shows the clearing of large tracts of mangrove forest for shrimp farms. Critics of the development say this is depriving forest-dependent local communities of their livelihoods as well as threatening mangrove wildlife.
  • Several communities have banded together and are together petitioning the government to officially recognize their rights to the remaining mangroves and prevent further clearing for development.

TELAGA, Malaysia — The district of Pitas in the Malaysian state of Sabah is situated on the 40-kilometer Bengkoka peninsula on the island of Borneo, stretching east into the South China sea.

This forested, hilly area slopes down to the coast along the Telaga River, through ancient mangrove forest. But since the 1980s, it has been increasingly opened up by government-sanctioned development projects; more recently, in 2013, mangrove clearance has resumed for the commercial farming of shrimp (also referred to as prawns). This resurgence has brought the company Sunlight Inno Seafood Company Sdn Bhd, which is supported by the government, into conflict with local communities that depend on the mangroves for their livelihoods.

In response to mangrove clearance, six indigenous Orang Asli communities in the district have come together to form the “Group of Six” (G6) collective Pitas action committee. It aims to save around 1,000 acres of the remaining mangroves and get this area legally designated under their Native Customary Rights (NCR).

Farmer and fisherman Mastupang Bin Somoi, 52, from Kampung Sungai Eloi, is founder and Chairman of the G6 collective. In his gardens he grows vegetables, rice and a few rubber and oil palm trees. He shows me a handful of large shellfish he has gathered from the muddy riverbed at the nearby boat landing. He says the villagers in the area depend on a mix of farming, fishing and collecting non-timber forest products from the mangrove forest for their livelihoods.

“They used to be quite friendly, they were not scared of humans, but now after their habitat’s been destroyed they’ll keep their distance,” Somoi says as he watches two proboscis monkeys (Nasalis larvatus) bound through the trees. As the boat he’s on proceeds along a channel through the mangroves, a two-meter (6.5-foot) estuarine crocodile (Crocodylus porosus) slides from the bank into the water. These mangrove forests are home to a wide diversity of vulnerable species, some of them listed under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

“This sign says, ‘no encroachment’,” says Somoi, pointing to a sign tied to a tree. The signs have been placed by the communities to demarcate the perimeter of the mangrove forest claimed under their NCR. Around 2,300 acres have already been cleared under the project and this is set to expand next into an additional 1,000 acres, pending the outcome of an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) started in 2015.

Further along, Somoi points out a burial site he says is sacred to the communities. Soon the dense mangrove forest opens into a clearing of stark devastation with dead mangrove roots bleached silver by the tropical sun and the dark peat earth beneath torn into grooves by heavy equipment. Most of the forest has already been cleared and the communities are desperate to retain the remainder on which they depend for resources, as well as the other ecosystem services it provides.

The shrimp farms cut out of the mangrove forests are secured with two-meter-high solid metal fences backed with coils of razor wire to keep people out. One plot visited by Mongabay was an area about 400 meters (1,300 feet) across containing artificial ponds in which water was being circulated with turbine pumps; a handful of workers was on-site.

Lanash Thanda, president of the NGO Sabah Environmental Protection Association (SEPA), described how the project was originally initiated by the Sabah Forest Development Authority (SAFODA) as part of the 2010 Malaysian Economic Transformation Programme to bring economic development to the poverty stricken area. “There is no water connection so people save rainwater from their roofs and when that is gone have to pay for deliveries,” Thanda said. She explained that levels of poverty in Pitas are high compared with most of Sabah. However, according to Thanda, the project has floundered due to mismanagement and a lack of processing, storage and transportation infrastructure. “Look at their office – it’s new. That’s the prawn farm company. When I came in November it wasn’t there,” said Thanda, explaining how the project is proceeding despite initial deficiencies. “The Sunlight company was supposed to open a plant in Pitas to process prawns and provide 3,000 jobs, but nothing is happening,” Thanda told Mongabay. She said local people are dismayed that foreign workers have been brought in, and that few of the jobs originally promised have materialized. Sunlight Inno Seafood Company Sdn Bhd did not respond to requests for comment.

The boat stops at a large stand of dead mangrove trees. The communities suspect they were poisoned because at the same time the trees died, “all the fish died” in the area, Thanda said. This area of mangroves was frequently used by local communities, and its destruction galvanized members from the G6 collective into action. In June 2015 they confronted workers clearing the area with heavy equipment.

“We spoke to the other G6 communities. Thirty-seven members came down. We posted a notice and painted the hitachis [digging equipment],” Somoi said. “In the notice we explained that we are giving you [the equipment operators] 24 hours notice to vacate this area, because this is our NCR [Native Customary Rights] area. If you do not leave after this we will not be responsible for actions taken against you from the communities. Then we left.” According to Thanda, thirty staff from the G6 communities working in the shrimp farms were sacked within the following month. She suspects that this was punitive retaliation by the shrimp company for protesting further clearance.

The equipment was subsequently removed and the Environmental Protection Department responded that an EIA would now be conducted on the area to assess whether clearance should proceed. But despite beginning in 2015, the EIA is still pending. The G6 collective has since been active in denouncing the conduct of the EIA process and the project in general. Meanwhile, according to SEPA, in December 2015 the State Cabinet approved clearance of a further 3,000 hectares of mangrove forest in the region.

On April 27, 2017, a delegation from the G6 collective travelled to the state capital Kota Kinabalu to deliver a letter to Chief Minister Datuk Seri Musa Aman, requesting that he intervene to stop the mangrove clearance. The Borneo Post reported that the letter requested the First Minister “to intervene and protect the land in their villages from alleged encroachment by the owners of a prawn farming project there.” The Chief Minister has yet to respond to their request.
Clearance of the forest is nothing new to the communities. Bihahon Rumindon, 67, from Kampong Boluuh village (which is a member of the G6 collective), has been fighting for recognition of his land title for years. He says that while he was awarded the land by the Sabah Forestry Development Authority (SAFODA) in 1971, SAFODA did not follow though on the allocation commitment and instead used it for a local acacia plantation project now managed by Acacia Forest Industries Sdn Bhd (AFI). The company is currently structured as a 50:50 joint venture between SAFODA and the Hijauan Bengkoka Plantations Sdn Bhd (HASB) company and supported by SAFODA.

According to AFI literature, HASB is: “a Sabah based company the ultimate shareholders of which are two international timber funds. Tropical Asia Forest Fund (TAFF) is the majority shareholder managed by New Forests.”
Requests for comment sent to AFI were unanswered by press time.
Rumindon explained that his people, the Rungus indigenous people, were originally nomadic. He and his neighbors agreed to settle on the land offered to them by SAFODA. He said the department offered 18 acres of land per family if they agreed to give up their nomadic tradition, settle there and clear the forest to cultivate crops. “There was a survey conducted and stones put in the ground in 1974,” Rumindon explained, thumbing through a thick folder of correspondence with government officials.

According to Rumindon, in the late 1970s the community agreed to requests from the original acacia company, Hijuan Planters, to rent the land, because the company said it would clear it. Mongabay visited AFI’s loading dock where cranes load vast piles of acacia logs onto barges destined for pulp and paper mills. “SAFODA says we are encroachers” said Rumindon, who despite his age is still struggling for a just outcome and says it was SAFODA that leased it to the company. Rumindon says the land was never returned. AFI, which took over operations more recently, retains occupation of the plantation area still under operation, and their claim appears to be supported by SAFODA.

“It took seven years to get hold of the [paper] plan,” Rumindon explained, unrolling a large detailed plan of community land from the land department. It appears to conflict with an earlier plan that clearly shows the plots allocated to community families. “SAFODA began designing reforestation and settlement projects in Bengkoka in early 1979,” reads a translated version of SAFODA’s website. “Acacia mangium cultivation was started in 1981. This project is the only large-scale institutional farm dedicated to commercial purposes.” The site does not mention an earlier land agreement, and requests for comment sent by Mongabay to several senior SAFODA staff went unanswered.

In its charter, translated from Malay to English, SAFODA says it is committed to: “Restoring and maintaining an environmentally friendly balance including flora and fauna through forestry activities.”
Rapid clearance of natural eco-systems for development projects in Sabah is an ongoing issue of concern to conservationists, and the situation in Pitas is no exception. As forest is razed for development, already-threatened species may be placed at greater risk. Meanwhile, local communities may face the loss of the many valuable ecosystem services mangrove forests provide, such as fishing, foraging and water catchment.
So far, local indigenous groups say their appeals for official recognition of their rights over these lands have largely been ignored. Critics say government development plans remain firmly in favor of supporting big businesses, despite damaging environmental consequences.

by Rod Harbinson on 13 September 2017.

Originally published by Mongabay Series: Global Forest Reporting Network

  • Pitas_Sabah02
    Mastupang Bin Somoi, 52, from Kampung Sungai Eloi stands in front of an area of mangrove forest which has been killed off for clearance through unknown means. The authority for clearing the area is contested because at the time the company responsible did not have the required environmental impact assessment.
  • Pitas_Sabah06
    Mastupang Bin Somoi, 52, from Kampung Sungai Eloi paddles his boat through ancient mangrove forests on which his community depends for fish and produce. Much of the forest has already been cleared and the community is keen to maintain an area to sustain their livelihoods. The mangrove are an important...
  • Pitas_Sabah07
    Mastupang Bin Somoi, from Kampung Sungai Eloi in Pitas holds a handful of shellfish that he has foraged in a stream in the mangrove forest.
  • Pitas_Sabah04
    Mastupang Bin Somoi stands amongst the threatened mangroves he is campaigning to save from prawn farms and get recognised under the community native customary rights.
  • Pitas_Sabah01
    Mastupang Bin Somoi, inspects the operations of the AFI company which operates acacia plantations on land claimed by the neighbouring communities.
  • Pitas_Sabah03
    Two indigenous 'Orang Asli' fishers row through an area of mangroves on forest claimed for their customary native forest. It was previously destroyed for prawn farms being set up in the area.
  • Pitas_Sabah05
    A fenced off area of prawn farm established in an area cleared from the surrounding mangrove forest which is claimed by local indigenous communities.
  • Pitas_Sabah08
    A truck laden with Acacia logs is transported along a trail in Pitas district, Sabah, East Malaysia.

The power of Participatory Video

An indigenous Yaqui man films the sunset over the Gulf of California during a workshop with Comcaac facilitators which highlighted over-fishing around protected Tiburon Island. Credit: Thor Morales/InsightShare.

The first lesson we are taught in the Participatory Video training by NGO InsightShare taking place last October in Oxford, UK, is that mistakes are great! This is reassuring to many attending the week-long seminar, as making and screening a video to an audience can be, even for an experienced film-maker, a daunting task. Perhaps this approach is to put people unfamiliar with sophisticated technical equipment at ease.

We learn that for people in distant developing countries, often with little or no access to electricity, there are real challenges to overcome to get to grips with the Participatory Video process. Yet despite the challenges, among those involved in a growing global network of practitioners, there is a shared experience that participatory video, or ‘PV’ in short, generates remarkable results.

InsightShare is a key organisation at the forefront of pioneering and developing this methodology. PV first evolved in Canada in the late 1960s. Don Snowden was an early pioneer who developed the PV methodology at a small fishing community on Fogo Island in Newfoundland. InsightShare has been actively building the skills of communities worldwide since it began in the late nineties. Since then it has accrued a deep body of knowledge used to refine the effectiveness of its teaching.

The workshop curriculum is developed by drawing on years of accumulated hands-on experience in the field. Workshops are practically orientated with participants encouraged to learn by doing. At the end of the process the participants can showcase a tangible outcome of their efforts – their own video.

Although a simple concept at its core, implementing the PV process in the field can be fraught with difficulties. This is especially so as many of the communities with which InsightShare works are poor, often exploited and at the margins of society. Many have difficult issues to confront which can sometimes include tensions within the community itself or conflicts with powerful external actors such as corporations or governments.

Simply put, PV is a way of teaching people to make their own videos using video cameras and editing equipment. Used to support communities in developing countries, it has been gaining credence for some years as a way of providing them with a vehicle to identify and amplify their collective voice.

Many of those who have experienced the workshop-led process say they have found the experience empowering because it provides a way in which they can express themselves, their culture and opinions, without interference from outsiders who often promote their own agendas.

“They are open to it. So it’s another way of building community… that for them is really new, as a way of addressing their issues, their problems, their situations, or just showing what is beautiful within their territory. So I think they realise that this approach is different.” explained Thor Edmundo Morales. He has been an Associate with InsightShare since 2015, facilitating trainings in his native Mexico and more recently Liberia and Kenya in Africa.

The practical dimension of PV is to provide communities with the skills and equipment to produce their own videos about the lives of their community, their neighbours, relatives and each other. Then the process enables them to use these videos in ways that they find useful – however they decide that might be.

A typical film screening premiere will first entail showing the films to the community itself, so that everyone involved can identify with the results and share in the collective experience. Often this leads to discussion and self-reflection which can deepen understanding of important issues within the community.

“I think communities see themselves within the mirror which is the screen. Seeing themselves in the video, they start spotting new problems, issues, concerns or things they like, that they haven’t seen before.” explained Thor.

Many of InsightShare’s projects are with Indigenous People, often living in remote regions, and frequently with little access to services that we take for granted such as electricity. So it is something of a paradox that the PV methodology is quite heavily laden with high-tech equipment requiring an electricity power supply.

This issue throws up a bundle of technical and teaching issues which the PV methodology needs to overcome and address in order to be successfully adopted. People living in marginal circumstances are often dependent on subsistence livelihoods, making the most of the local environment to provide through forest foraging, agriculture, fishing or animal husbandry. Often participants will not have come into contact with modern equipment such as video cameras and computers in their day to day lives, and these will be unfamiliar to them.

The introductory process involves a series of exercises to help participants get acquainted with the concepts and equipment. Thor explained how he found workshop participants in Africa initially fearful of the technology, but this soon changed: “When they first saw the computer they were really afraid to use it and then after about two hours they were like, oh this is so easy,” he said.

“In Mexico many people we work with, particularly amongst the Yaqui, they had never touched a camera or computer before.” explained Thor. The Yaqui indigenous people live in the Sonora desert region in Northern Mexico. They have faced violence and intimidation as companies construct a gas pipeline across their territory, infringing their rights and threatening the fragile environment.

Anabela Jeka Carlon Flores, an indigenous Yaqui lawyer, is fighting the pipeline with her community of Loma De Bacun. In April 2016, Anabela’s community won a legal ruling requiring suspension of pipeline construction across Yaqui territory. However, the companies behind the pipeline: SEMPRA and INOVA, have ignored the court ruling and continued building.

Undeterred Anabela continued campaigning for justice, but in December 2016 she was kidnapped along with her husband and once released fled fearing for her life.

Anabela attended an InsightShare workshop with other members of her community in 2015 and soon came to appreciate the benefits: “The main benefits are that people are really thinking about their land, their culture, they are questioning. Before you cannot really see that they question big projects.” said Anabela, at a safe location some distance away from her home community, shortly after her kidnap ordeal. Soon she plans to overcome the threats she has received and return home.

Different communities around the world find PV useful for different reasons explains Thor: “The Yaqui use the cameras to record interviews, to show as proof to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, for the struggle they were having. They gathered a lot of interviews and sent them as evidence to sustain their case,” he said.

While InsightShare refrains from getting directly involved in community struggles, it does equip communities with the tools and skills to be able to put forward their perspectives and opinions, sometimes to policy-makers or companies that are disrupting their lives. This is in keeping with the now widely established view that effective development must recognise power relationships and equip people with the skills to be able to participate in the discussions and decision-making processes that effect them.

The Maasai people of Kenya and Tanzania in East Africa are nomadic pastoralists who regularly move with their herds of goats and cattle. After independence it was agreed that the Maasai would move from their lands to allow the creation of the Serengeti game reserve.  They were given new lands in the Ngorongoro region, which is now hotly contested by different stakeholder’s including the government, conservationists, investors, the tourism industry and the Maasai people themselves.

The Maasai say that in recent years their community rights to use the land have been increasingly eroded and ignored. Along with big game animals The Maasai became a familiar part of the safari tour, regularly appearing in safari promotional literature and media coverage.

“The image and the name of the Maasai is used to sell everything from the safari tour to I don’t know – hand soap. Just everything. It is a very heavily exploited image. One that is not in the control of the Maasai people themselves.” said InsightShare facilitator Gareth Benest, who has held PV workshops with the Maasai.

“Everyone was distressed and emotional.  We discussed how the Maasai brand is worth an estimate US$10 million annually but the community gains no benefit.  This was one of the most difficult sessions I have ever had with the group.” said Gareth.

It is not only ongoing voyeurism of the Maasai and exploitation of their image.  Since colonial times a romanticized view of their lives has been constructed by outsiders projecting their own view of the Maasai upon them, which may be completely inaccurate. It may also gloss over pressing issues.

Gareth explained how at their first workshop the Maasai participants were excited to be able to tell their own story: “They said that we’ve had journalists come and go. We’ve had film crews, we’ve had photographers come and go, and we’ve seen how other people tell our story, and now it’s time for us to tell our own story.”

“PV is a particularly interesting and exciting tool in enabling a community that has never benefited from being able to represent themselves in the world, to start to take control of their own image, albeit in a small way to begin with.” Gareth explained.

Sometimes the burning issues for a community have less to do with pressures from outside and more to do with contested issues within the community itself such as changing attitudes towards cultural traditions. Alternatively, it is common for powerful actors seeking to exploit communities, to use divide and rule tactics (such as bribes, intimidation and offers of work), to create conflict within communities, so weakening their opposition.

“I was given an award, a distinguished human right defender” said Samwel Nangiria of NGO-Net in April 2017. He was awarded the Rural Human Rights Defender of the Year by NGO the Tanzania Human Rights Coalition. “Human rights have no borders and its protection calls for global community. It was really emotional. The Olosho video was screened to show the voices of the people… I mean I had to shed tears of hope and happiness. There will be a big community reception party in Loliondo… It’s a victory for the entire community.” said Samwel.

Samwel is from Loliondo in the Tanzanian state of Arusha and has been involved in PV since the first workshop was held in 2015. He said that PV has improved, “Unity among communities, and in particular the clans within Loliondo.” He said, “the video has restored trust” and bridged the breakdown in communication between segments of the community and clans, “that was rampant before.” Samwel explained.

“Three of them have had over a year of arrests, of beatings, Samwel was tortured.” Gareth said, explaining that the impact of the video has caused the government to review its approach. “Previously the government thought, well all we have to do is silence the troublemakers, get rid of these individuals and we’ll be able to implement our own plans for the land. When the video came out there was a realisation that even if they do silence those people, they can’t stop the community’s voice from being heard. The government changed its whole approach because of this. It no longer saw force as an option.” Gareth explained.

Samwel relayed how his community found the PV process provided a way to amplify their  concerns and ensured that they were heard, even in political decision-making circles: “The Olosho video was taken by many politicians at the last general elections (in 2015) as a starting point for our community based land rights campaign.”

“Recently, the video was re-screened before the government mission that was in the district trying to strike a balance between wildlife and people in the Loliondo Areas. The mission was seeking for the community position with regards to wildlife conservation and investment in the village lands.” said Samwel.

A finished video product is usually, though not always, a significant outcome of the PV process. However, Gareth is keen to stress that their model of PV is not driven by video outputs. Sometimes there are situations in which members of the group consider that releasing their film could attract adverse attention, exacerbate community divisions or provoke repression from external forces.

The most important result of the experience is not necessarily the final video, but more the learning and experiences shared by community members as they go through the production process.

Assessing the precise impact of the PV process is arguably impossible as it is not just about counting the number of finished videos produced. However the growing body of monitoring and evaluation learning that InsightShare has gathered, demonstrates the effectiveness of the methodology, and this has proved attractive to donors, ever keen to show that their money has real and tangible outcomes.

Once the workshop is finished and it is time for InsightShare’s facilitators to move on, the question arises as to what happens in future. InsightShare is always keen to leave behind the hardware (camera, sound equipment and laptop) to enable communities to continue making videos in their own time and for their own needs.

Samwel explained that PV has had a “high multiplying effect.” and he is working to train others in the community to pass on the skills: “We would like to advance the capacity-building of the group (‘Oltoilo-le-Maa’, meaning ‘Voice of the Maasai’) to establish a simple and functioning community media hub.” he said.

“The videos we created in Mexico, I took them to Kenya and Liberia and we showed them.” Said Thor, explaining the benefits of sharing and reflecting on PV work, no matter where in the world it has been produced. Thor explains the wider strategy being pursued for networking groups together: “InsightShare is trying to make a network where people trained by InsightShare actually meet each other…Put people together so they can interact.” he said. This network of regional hubs is now taking shape to share experiences of PV worldwide.

As the workshop wraps up in Oxford the group forms a circle and reflects on the six day training. Everyone shares how the intensive learning experience has both touched and challenged them in different ways. On one thing everyone agrees – the PV process involves much more than simply making a video.

  • SunsetVideoCam
    An indigenous Yaqui man films the sunset over the Gulf of California during a workshop with Comcaac facilitators which highlighted over-fishing around protected Tiburon Island. Credit: Thor Morales/InsightShare.
  • ThorBavicora-100
    La Marabunta Filmadora began life as community video project bringing Comcaac and Yaqui participants together for the first time in 2010. Credit: Thor Morales/InsightShare.
  • YaquiWorkshop
    Facilitators from the Comcaac people have turned the camera on themselves to address complex local issues concerning over-fishing around the protected Tiburon Island in the Gulf of California. Credit: Thor Morales/InsightShare.
  • ThorBavicora-102screeing
    Indigenous facilitators reached the remote village of Bavicora in Mexico after a 9 hour mule ride! They introduced participatory video to this Guarijio community living in the lower sierras on the border between Sonora and Chihuahua states. Credit: Thor Morales/InsightShare.
  • AnabelaFlores
    La Marabunta Filmadora began life as community video project bringing Comcaac and Yaqui participants together for the first time in 2010. Now they make participatory videos with Guarijios, Mayos, Pimas, and Raramuri indigenous groups, reaching right across northern Mexico. Credit: Thor Morales/InsightShare.
  • Maasai1
    Since learning participatory video the Maasai group ‘Oltoilo Le-Maa’ (translates as ‘Voice of the Maasai’) now have new tools to defend their land. Credit: Gareth Benest/InsightShare.
  • Maasai2
    Maasai activists from Loliondo in Tanzania make their own video documenting their ongoing land rights struggle. Credit: Gareth Benest/InsightShare.

Learn more about PV on the InsightShare website.

By Rod Harbinson

Activists defy Malaysian state to defend indigenous forests

Temiar indigenous activists in Pos Gob district in Kelantan state, West Malaysia.
  • Deep in the rainforests of northern Malaysia, anti-logging campaigns are trying to stop logging companies from entering forests they say belong to Orang Asli communities.
  • Blockades are being set up in peninsular Malaysia’s northern state of Kelantan by groups that say logging activities are damaging forests and the surrounding environment.
  • Kelantan has seen more forest clearing in recent years as the state ramps up tree plantation development.
    Activist groups say forestry departments are granting forest access to logging companies, while restricting access to forest-dependent communities.
  • Malaysian courts ruled recently that forests being targeted by logging companies belong to indigenous Orang Asli communities.

GUAMUSANG, Malaysia – In their fight for the rights of peninsular Malaysia’s native people, the Orang Asli, an alliance of women are making waves in the country’s highly conservative society as they support the efforts of communities and activists trying to stop logging of the region’s forests. The women represent a variety of fields and organizations and are speaking out and even risking arrest in their struggle for the forests and the communities that depend on them.

Mongabay joined them on a convoy deep into the rainforests of northern Malaysia’s Kelantan State to supply provisions to anti-logging campaigns, traveling by night to evade detection by State Forestry Department police. Here, the Temiar indigenous peoples are resisting deforestation by setting up road blockade camps in local forest reserves. By March 2017, three blockade camps had reportedly been torn down by forestry police, but the Temiar vowed to set up more.

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The terrain was mountainous and the dirt logging trail had been regularly pounded by the heavy monsoon rains, making progress treacherous. The convoy passed Orang Asli villages along the road, punctuated with log piles and bulldozers at the trackside.

“If we see any of the big guys [elephants], turn off your engine and lights and wait for them to pass,” Karin Lee of PEKA (Preservation of Natural Heritage Organization) announced over the radio to the convoy.


Published on Mongabay.com

Full story
  • Forest_Blockades01
    Early morning mist hangs over the forest in Pos Gob district in Kelantan state, West Malaysia.
  • Forest_Blockades02
    Indigenous Temiar children lean against a tree at the centre of their village of Kampong Tambaga, Pos Gob district in Kelantan state, West Malaysia.
  • Forest_Blockades03
    Early morning mist hangs over the forest in the Pos Gob district of Kelantan state, West Malaysia.
  • Forest_Blockades04
    Indigenous Temiar men take shelter from the rain in a dilapidated building in Pos Gob district in Kelantan state, West Malaysia.
  • Forest_Blockades05
    An indigenous Temiar man stands in front of rainforest that has been selectively logged in Pos Gob district in Kelantan state, West Malaysia.
  • Forest_Blockades06
    Temiar indigenous activists in Pos Gob district in Kelantan state, West Malaysia.
  • Forest_Blockades07
    An indigenous Temiar woman with flowers in her hair from Kampong Tambaga, Pos Gob district in Kelantan state, West Malaysia.
  • Forest_Blockades08
    Headman of Kampong Tambaga, Pos Gob district in Kelantan state, West Malaysia.
  • Forest_Blockades09
    Women pounding the husks off rice, Kampong Tambaga village, Pos Gob district, Kelantan state, West Malaysia.
  • Forest_Blockades10
    Sabrina Syed, President of charity PEKA, shortly before her arrest by Forestry Department guards from Gua Musang in Kelantan State, West Malaysia. Pos Gob district.
  • Forest_Blockades11
    An indigenous Temiar man leans against a tree at the centre of his village of Kampong Tambaga, Pos Gob district in Kelantan state, West Malaysia.
  • Forest_Blockades12
    A logging truck at the side of the road in Kelantan state, Malaysia.

Is a property boom in Malaysia causing a fisheries bust?

    • Driven by high demand for housing, developers in Malaysia’s Penang Island are artificially expanding the coastline and planning to construct new islands.
    • Local fishers say building works have already damaged their livelihoods, and fear further construction will destroy their fishing grounds.
    • Mangroves and endangered bird species are also threatened, and the mining and transport of construction materials could spread adverse environmental impacts beyond just Penang.

PENANG, Malaysia — Fisherman Liew Hock Choon, 50, cut the outboard engine and explained that we have arrived at the position of one of his fish traps. “No GPS,” he said.

Using a method called triangulation, his keen eyes pinpointed natural markers on the shoreline and used these bearings to locate his traps with incredible accuracy. With an anchor thrown down, he snagged his trap and hauled it up. The deck was soon awash with flapping fish. These are grouper — prized in the restaurants of Penang and beyond, they fetch a premium price and can only be caught with hooks or traps, Liew explained. He said customers travel from as far as Hong Kong to buy these prized delicacies.

“Look at this mud in the traps,” Liew complained as just two of his four traps contained a catch worth keeping. Still, it was a good day under the circumstances. One phone call later and the 11 kilograms (24 pounds) of grouper were snapped up by a restaurant owner eager to purchase them for over 500 ringgit ($113). They were still alive when Liew delivered and weighed them while hungry customers looked on.

“I know this area very well because in my school days I followed one of the fishermen,” said Liew, from Tanjung Bungah a village North of Penang Island’s capital Georgetown. Now the days of his fishing grounds are numbered because of a land reclamation project by a local property developer.

“This area is very rich with mud crab, shrimp, snapper, and grouper, but soon it will all be gone,” said Liew.


Published on Mongabay.com

Full story

  • Penang_Reclamation_01
    Penang fisherman Mr Liew Hock Choon, 50, is from Tanjung Bungah a village North of Penang Island’s capital Georgetown. Here he prepares his fishing boat to go a collect his fish traps in the reclamation area. Land reclamation for infrastructure projects and property is becoming more widespread in Asia. On...
  • Penang_Reclamation_02
    Reclamation building works underway as part of a new island being constructed by the seri Tanjung Pinang company with Chinese expertise. Here a workman inspects the sand reclamation at the edge of the new island.
  • Penang_Reclamation_03
  • Penang_Reclamation_04
    Reclamation building works underway as part of a new island being constructed by the Seri Tanjung Pinang company, a subsidiary of Oriental and Eastern company. Land reclamation for infrastructure projects and property is becoming more widespread in Asia. On Penang island schemes are increasing, especially to build high class housing....
  • Penang_Reclamation_06
    Penang fisherman Mr Liew Hock Choon, 50, is from Tanjung Bungah a village North of Penang Island’s capital Georgetown. Here he delivers his catch of 11 kilos of prized grouper fish to a local restaurant keen to buy them.
  • Penang_Reclamation_08
    Mr Kamaruddin, 70, is fixing his net on the beach next to his home at Tanjung Tokong, Penang Island. Land reclamation for infrastructure projects and property is becoming more widespread in Asia.
  • Penang_Reclamation_09
    A cat sits in fisherman Mr Kamaruddin's net on Tanjung Tokong beach, north of Penang capital Georgetown. The beach sits amidst large-scale land reclamation projects.
  • Penang_Reclamation_10
    Mr Kamaruddin, 70, is fixing his net on the beach next to his home at Tanjung Tokong, Penang Island.
  • Penang_Reclamation_11
    A horseshoe crab in a tank at Tanjung Tokong, Penang, Malaysia. Until five years ago Mr Kamaruddin used to keep crabs in a net in the sea but then they started to die from the muddy sediment in the water stirred up by reclamation construction work.
  • Penang_Reclamation_12
    Fisherman Mr Mohd-Ishak (left) is Chairman of the Northern Fishing Community Group of Tanjung Tokong on Penang Island. On Penang island schemes are increasing, especially to build high class housing. The projects require large volumes of building materials, especially sand, and have an impact on the environment especially marine biodiversity....
  • Penang_Reclamation_13
    Two girls playing on Tanjung Tokong beach on Penang Island Malaysia, with fishing boats behind. The beach is surrounded by a large land reclamation scheme which is affecting the fishery and fishermen are complaining that catches are down.
  • Penang_Reclamation_16
    People walk past a row of rickshaws in Georgetown, capital of Penang Island in Malaysia. Parts of the old colonial Chinatown have been awarded UNESCO world heritage status.
  • Penang_Reclamation_17
    A shopkeeper stands amidst piles of old ephemera in a junkshop in old Georgetown, capital of Penang Island in Malaysia. Parts of the old colonial Chinatown have been awarded UNESCO world heritage status.