Jakarta – President Joko Widodo today inaugurated Ir. Hartono, M.Sc as Head of the Peat and Mangrove Restoration Agency. This inauguration also marked an extension of the Peat Restoration Agency (Badan Restorasi Gambut – BRG) service period and an additional task.
Formed by Presidential Regulation No.1 of 2016, BRG has the task of coordinating and facilitating peat restoration in 7 provinces, namely Riau, Jambi, South Sumatra, West Kalimantan, Central Kalimantan, South Kalimantan and Papua. The task was carried out from January 6, 2016 to December 31, 2020.
During that period, BRG had completed initial efforts to wet the peat ecosystem covering 835,288 hectares outside the concession (94% of the target) and technical supervision/assistance for 186 plantation companies with an area included in the target restoration of 538,439 hectares (96.89% of the target).
Then, assistance and institutional strengthening were carried out in 640 Peat Care Villages with an area of 4.6 million hectares of peatland in the village (1.4 million hectares included in the peat restoration target).
Economic revitalization activities involving 2,295 community groups (Pokmas) with around 118,576 people involved in labor-intensive activities. Various other efforts were made related to the use of science and technology in monitoring.
The government views efforts to accelerate peat restoration need to be continued. One of the considerations is because the Government has established policies to prevent forest and land fires permanently, including in peat areas.
In addition, the Government has also established a policy for mangrove restoration through rehabilitation. It is necessary to accelerate the implementation of its implementation so that BRG is given additional tasks for this. The President also decided that BRG would become the Peat and Mangrove Restoration Agency.
Hartono or familiarly called Pak Har previously served as Secretary of the BRG. He is a career bureaucrat who before joining BRG served at the Ministry of Environment and Forestry. Born in Ngawi, East Java 58 years ago, Pak Har has worked on forest and land rehabilitation and conservation management in Indonesia.
“In several locations, the peat ecosystem is connected to mangroves so that mangrove protection also protects the peat ecosystem as well. We must understand the characteristics of these two ecosystems very well. Damage occurs due to utilization that is not in accordance with the characteristics of peat and mangrove. Moreover, both peat and mangroves are also part of the ecosystem that really need to be protected,” said Hartono.
He then added that BRGM was ready to work together with the relevant Ministries and the Regional Government as well as other parties, especially the community, who had so far shown better awareness.
In this new BRGM task, efforts to accelerate efforts are being made to 1.2 million hectares of peat ecosystems and 600 thousand mangroves. In addition to the 7 provinces that have become targets for peat restoration, BRGM will also work in 6 new provinces, especially for mangroves. The six are North Sumatra, Riau Islands, Bangka Belitung, East Kalimantan, North Kalimantan and West Papua.
Separately, Nazir Foead as the Head of BRG 2016-2020 congratulated this inauguration. “I believe Mr. Hartono is very experienced in managing this institution because we both started BRG from scratch. Let’s support BRGM’s work in the future.” said Hartono.
Anang Fadhilah
