Which Way Forward

CHAPTER NINE

Timber ConcessionReform: Questioning the“Sustainable Logging” Paradigm

Christopher Barr

Since the mid-1980s, policy discussions aimed at promoting sustainable forest management in Indonesia have focused almost exclusively on re forming the Hak Pengusahaan Hutan ([HPH] Forest Concession, Forest Exploitation Rights) timber concession system.¹ This emphasis on HPH reform is hardly surprising given the pressures that Indonesia's commercial logging industry has put on the nation's forests over the last three decades. Since 1967, when the New Order regime opened the rich Dipterocarp forests of the Outer Islands to large-scale timber extraction, the Government of Indonesia (GOI) has allocated a total of 585 HPHs, covering 62 million ha, ...