- The European Union has launched four projects in Indonesia aimed at empowering civil society organizations as they participate in determining the country’s clean energy transition.
- The projects include support for CSOs advocating for the rights of Indigenous groups, women and youths as pertains to Indonesia’s goal of achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2060.
- The government is betting a large part of this transition on nickel as a key ingredient in batteries and other clean energy technology, but the mining and processing of the metal is wreaking environmental and social havoc on forests and communities.
- The effort to boost CSO participation comes as environmental and human rights defenders face an increasingly hostility and criminalization for criticizing government policies and projects.
JAKARTA — Civil society organizations in Indonesia are getting a boost to ensure their participation in the country’s clean energy transition and land stewardship, amid an increasingly hostile climate for groups advocating for environmental and social rights.
Four new projects launched June 27 by the European Union delegation to Indonesia are designed to strengthen CSO capacity and participation in the fields of land-use governance and the energy transition; support for Indigenous peoples and local communities; gender equality and youth empowerment; and human rights monitoring and advocacy.
Denis Chaibi, the EU ambassador to Indonesia, said the projects aligned with the Indonesian government’s goals of transitioning away from fossil fuels, reducing deforestation while increasing reforestation, and ultimately achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2060.
To ensure these goals are met, there needs to be meaningful participation from CSOs as they’re a vital part of Indonesia’s democracy, Chaibi said.
“There’s no point in putting a lot of rules if people don’t follow the rules, if they are not convinced. So it’s about the conviction of people, and for that it has to be an inclusive approach,” he said on the sidelines of the project launch in Jakarta. “The people have to be consulted. The people have to provide solutions. They have to give their feedback.”
Meaningful civic participation will also help ensure the government’s development agenda isn’t focused solely on reducing carbon emissions, but also benefits the public, according to Damayanti Buchori, director of the Center for Transdisciplinary and Sustainability Sciences at the Bogor Institute of Agriculture (IPB).
This way, “no one will get left behind,” she said.
A less-than-clean energy transition
The first of the four projects, implemented by conservation NGOs WWF-Indonesia and Auriga Nusantara, will support several local CSOs in supporting responsible land stewardship and the energy transition in the provinces of Jambi, Central Kalimantan, Southeast Sulawesi and Central Sulawesi over the next three years.
Sulawesi is key to Indonesia’s energy transition, as it’s the hub of Indonesia’s booming nickel industry, a central element in batteries and other clean-energy technology, according to Aditya Bayunanda, CEO of WWF-Indonesia.
Indonesia holds the world’s largest reserves of nickel, estimated at 21 million metric tons. But the mining and smelting boom, concentrated in Indonesia’s eastern islands, has come with environmental and social impacts, including clear-cutting of forests for mines and industrial estates, air and water pollution, and human rights violations.
Southeast Sulawesi, one of the provinces hosting the EU-backed project, has also seen a tenfold increase in floods and landslides since the mining boom began, according to official data — a result of the industrial-scale deforestation of the hilly landscape.
“These are the places impacted by the energy transition agenda,” Aditya said on the sidelines of the project launch.
The nickel drive also threatens one of the world’s last remaining Indigenous tribes living in voluntary isolation, on the island of Halmahera. Two companies from the EU, Germany’s BASF and France’s Eramet, recently announced they were pulling out of a planned $2.6 billion nickel-and-cobalt smelter project there following an international uproar over the potential loss of forests that are home to the Forest Tobelo people.
“In the energy transition agenda, we have to prioritize Indigenous peoples,” Damayanti of IPB said. “We understand that not all lands have to be cleared.”
She also questioned the capitalist model of chasing infinite growth on the back of finite resources, saying it’s necessary to look beyond just GDP to other indicators of human well-being and progress.
“Perhaps the growth doesn’t have to be that high, and we should prioritize justice for IPLCs, because in the long term, forests are the ones that provide ecosystem services,” she said. “That’s why we have to protect the environment. We know that Indigenous peoples are the guardians of the forests, protectors of the environment, so we have to respect them.”
The same EU project as carried out in Jambi and Central Kalimantan provinces will look to develop the capacity of farmers and local stakeholders in implementing agroforestry within oil palm plantations.
“While it’s not the same as forest, in terms of biodiversity it’s still much better than monoculture palm oil plantations,” WWF-Indonesia’s Aditya said, adding that agroforestry plots can help mitigate some of the damage from oil palm plantations being carved out of forests.
At the same time, the project will both provide livelihoods for smallholder farmers and boost biodiversity and environmental services, he said. A longer-term benefit could even see the farmers export their products to markets that demand sustainability, such as the EU; the latter last year adopted a regulation banning the import of commodities associated with deforestation.
Indigenous, gender and rights advocacy
The second EU-backed project, implemented by Warsi Indonesian Conservation Community (KKI Warsi), Aksi! for Gender, Social, and Ecological Justice Organization, the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi) and the Netherlands office of global conservation authority the IUCN, is aimed at supporting Indigenous peoples and local communities in Jambi, Bengkulu and West Sumatra provinces.
The idea is for IPLCs there to be able to manage their forests in a sustainable and inclusive manner, and to encourage policies to improve their livelihoods and forest sustainability.
The third project is a collaboration between the Penabulu Foundation, ASEAN Youth Forum, Indonesian Data Journalism Network (IDJN) and Lokadaya Nusantara Network Foundation. Its goal is to strengthen CSO networks, with a particular focus on gender and youth, through the just energy transition.
The fourth project is being carried out by YAPPIKA-ActionAid and the Indonesian Association of Human Rights Lecturers (SEPAHAM) across the islands of Java, Borneo and Sumatra to support CSOs in more effectively voicing the concerns of communities impacted by the energy transition agenda.
“The information [presented by the CSOs] should be of high quality and can be utilized [by policymakers] and verified by anyone. So it has to be based on facts and well documented,” Aditya said. “Otherwise, the information can be easily dismissed as nonsense.”
This is also important to prevent the backlash and criminal charges that many CSOs across Indonesia experience for criticizing the government or government-led projects, Aditya added.
Increasingly hostile climate for CSOs
Recent years have seen a rise in the criminalization of human rights and environmental defenders, as well as government critics, through defamation lawsuits, harassment campaigns, intimidation, and both physical and online attacks.
In 2021, Luhut Pandjaitan, the chief minister in charge of investments and a close confidant of President Joko Widodo, accused Greenpeace Indonesia of spreading misinformation related to the country’s deforestation rate after it criticized the president. He used that incident to threaten an audit of Greenpeace and other foreign NGOs operating in the country.
That same year, Luhut filed a defamation lawsuit against two prominent human rights defenders, Haris Azhar and Fatia Maulidiyanti, after they pointed out — correctly — that the minister has links to mining companies operating in the Papua region. Extractive companies there are frequently accused of rights violations against local communities, backed by a heavy security presence because of the fact that the Papua region is a quasi-militarized zone to quell a long-simmering separatist movement.
In January this year, a court in Jakarta acquitted Haris and Fatia of all the charges.
Most recently, in May, a forum organized by activists advocating equal access to clean water in Bali was forcefully disbanded by a group of people. The assailants destroyed banners and billboards of the forum as well as physically attacked participants in the discussion.
All these incidents point to a regression in the country’s civil liberties under the Widodo administration, at least in the areas of freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and association, activists say.
“It’s very true” that civic space is shrinking, Damayanti said. That’s why it’s more important than ever that activists and academics have the courage to speak the truth and demand their rights, she said.
“It’s a challenge for both academics and civil society: Are we brave enough? We must be. If not, the government will have tremendous power and get rid of civic space [further],” Damayanti said. “We can’t do that. As a democracy, we have to have the courage to say what is right.”
Power of youth
Bogat Widyatmoko, a deputy to Indonesia’s national development planning minister, said the government would support and monitor the projects.
“With monitoring and evaluation, we could get feedback for better planning and implementation in the future. Because we all know that green transition is not an easy task, and I believe partnerships between Indonesia, EU and CSOs are very important,” he said.
At the projects’ launch, the EU also announced a platform for young Indonesians to give feedback on the initiatives. Known as the Youth Sounding Board, the platform brings together 15 Indonesians between the ages of 18 and 25 from across the country, selected for representing the power of young people in shaping future policies, said Chaibi, the EU ambassador.
“[B]ecause youth is much more sensitive to the impact of climate change because they have a longer future than the older people, so they’ll see that they will have to live with higher temperatures, more floods, more problems with water,” he said.
Silvi Angelia May Purba, a member of the board from Riau province, said she and the other board members wanted to amplify youth participation in public discussions.
“We as the Youth Sounding Board are committed to advise and empower other youths in Indonesia to collectively make efforts and impacts for a better planet and for a better future for Indonesian citizens,” she said. “Because we only have one planet, one Indonesia, therefore one future.”
Banner image: Denis Chaibi, the EU ambassador to Indonesia, launches four new projects to strengthen CSO capacity and participation in the fields of land-use governance and the energy transition; support for Indigenous peoples and local communities; gender equality and youth empowerment; and human rights monitoring and advocacy during a ceremony in Jakarta on June 27.
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