Forest community development: illegal activity, human right or matter of corporate responsibility?

This, in turn, leads to further degradation of natural resources, resulting in the erosion of the support basis for sustainable livelihoods. Provided with more sustainable and profitable alternatives or more legal alternatives, degradation of forest resources may be reduced or halted.

A number of alternative, more sustainable livelihood initiatives exist and are promoted by the government, but effective implementation on site requires assistance, tools and guidelines. Community Plantation Forest (Hutan Tanaman Rakyat - HTR), Social Forestry (Hutan Kemasyarakatan) and Community Forest (Hutan Rakyat) are recent initiatives launched by the Ministry of Forestry to create the basic conditions for sustainable livelihoods. Another recent development is the introduction of corporate social responsibility (CSR) for companies involved in natural resources extraction - changing CSR activity from voluntary into mandatory - which will provide communities with possible support from companies operating in their proximity.

To what extent these central government initiatives will help to increase the wellbeing of forest-dependent communities, and whether these will lead to a reduced pressure on forest resources and biodiversity, remains to be seen.

The principle research topics generated in this project is designed to address some of these issues:

• What are the effects on the ground of the new regulation on mandatory community development for all private companies where their operations directly affect local communities?
• What are the impacts of these new government and business approaches on both the sustainability of forest management and the improvement of community wellbeing?
• How large should forest areas be to be allocated for community use and how should they be defined?