Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) Sinar Mas recognizes our responsibility to the rural and forest communities that live and work in and around the boundaries of our supplier concessions. They are vital partners in many areas, including the prevention and suppression of wildfires, the protection of conservation forests, and in the fight against illegal encroachment.
As part of our 2013 Forest Conservation Policy (FCP), we committed to obtain Free, Prior and Informed Consent from affected communities before beginning any development work, even in areas where we already have established operations. The FPIC has since then been part of the development process of each of our pulpwood suppliers’ Annual Working Plan. Through the FPIC process, changes in operations or landscape, such as planting or harvesting, will be communicated to surrounding communities and their consent sought.
We are also committed to addressing land disputes with local communities as part of our FCP, starting with a comprehensive assessment and mapping of all existing land disputes that have not been resolved. This work was completed in 2013 with the help of The Forest Trust, and we began pilot projects to field test our dispute resolution guideline on three disputes that were then being worked on.
- The first was Senyerang village in Jambi, which dates back to 2000. Working with the Jambi Farmers Association (Persatuan Petani Jambi / PPJ) and Ministry of Environment and Forestry (MoEF), we eventually arrived at an acceptable resolution in July 2013. One of the report’s authors, WALHI Jambi, was involved in the beginning of the process.
- The second was Datuk Rajo Melayu group in Riau, which dates back to 2007. Resolution was reached in June 2015 with the involvement of Scale Up, a local NGO that specializes in partnership approaches to dispute resolution.
- The third project, at Riding village in South Sumatra, was resolved in March 2017. The resolution process was started in 2004 and involved Wahana Bumi Hijau (later changed to Hutan Kita Institute /HaKI), Impartial Mediator Network (IMN), local government and the Ministry of Environment and Forestry.
Like the report’s authors, we agree that land dispute resolution is a complex process. Each dispute is unique and requires a unique solution. Some disputes are more easily resolved, while others are more difficult, oftentimes requiring external intervention by the Government, such as in the case of overlapping licenses. This is the reason why, as noted in the report, APP Sinar Mas classifies the land dispute into six categories, each with different resolution approaches to the others.
From the pilot projects, we learned that information regarding land dispute is sensitive, and sharing such sensitive information does not always benefit the on-going resolution process. The dispute resolution process needs to be protected from interference by self-interested third parties, which can easily derail the mediation process. Despite that, we take the input from our stakeholders, and we recognize the value of adopting a multi-stakeholder approach to dispute resolution.
The multi-stakeholder approach to dispute resolution helps speed up the process and has better outcomes. Almost all the resolved disputes have involved multiple mediating parties, including local government, professional mediators and NGO representatives. However, involved parties must remain committed to the mediation process. When parties drop in and out of the process, any progress made often ends up being renegotiated, substantially slowing down the resolution.
With this purpose in mind, in 2017, we established Regional Social Working Groups in Riau, Jambi and South Sumatra, facilitated by Eco Nusantara, as an effort to help strengthen and speed up the resolution process. The Group is comprised of various stakeholders, including local government, law and mediation firms, and NGOs. The authors of this report have been invited to be part of this working group.
Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) Sinar Mas is aware that transparency is important. In 2013 at the beginning of the FCP implementation, Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) Sinar Mas has set up the Solution Working Group, a closed-door platform which invited several prominent environmental NGOs to discuss the progress and challenges of the FCP implementation. Environmental Paper Network (EPN) attended the meetings of the Solution Working Group.
In 2015, the Solution Working Group was transformed into the Stakeholder Advisory Forum, to provide access to our wider stakeholders, including the wider NGO community, to engage with us and provide their feedback on the implementation of the FCP.
To date, the Stakeholder Advisory Forum has been held eight times. The issue of community disputes and their resolution is often discussed at this forum. For example, at the SAF held in March 2019, we reported that 49% of identified disputes have been resolved, and sought advice from stakeholders on approaches to the remaining disputes, which are more complex in nature and thus, difficult to resolve. The authors of this report, as well as EPN, were always extended an invite.
Contrary to the report’s conclusions, Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) Sinar Mas is completely committed to the equitable and legal resolution of all pending disputes. APP Sinar Mas suppliers were the first companies to release portions of their concessions to communities in support of the Government of Indonesia’s Lands for Agrarian Reform (TORA) program.
Ultimately, all concessions are owned and governed by the Government of Indonesia. As concession holders, Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) Sinar Mas and our suppliers have a legal obligation to manage these lands responsibly and in accordance to their designated purpose. Any proposals or requests to alter, set aside or release land for purposes other than the legally designated purpose must be submitted to and decided by the Government.