A workshop that brings together restoration stakeholders at the national and regional levels (e.g. representatives of national and provincial governments, forest management units, non-governmental organizations, research institutes and universities, the private sector and the media) to discuss the various components of ROAM and its application in the Indonesian context.

Background

Forest and landscape restoration (FLR) is a long process to restore the ecological functions and improve human well-being in the forest and landscape suffering deforestation and degradation. In an effort to mainstream and implement FLR, the World Resources Institute (WRI) and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) worked collaboratively to publish a guideline or framework to identify FLR opportunities nationally and sub-nationally in a flexible, affordable, and efficient manner. The framework is called Restoration Opportunities Assessment Methodology (ROAM) or Metode Evaluasi Kesempatan Restorasi (MEKAR) in Bahasa Indonesia.

ROAM was first introduced to stakeholders and the public in Indonesia during a workshop entitled “Accelerating Action on Forests and Landscape Restoration Land in Indonesia: Challenges and Opportunities for Enhancing Ecological Resilience and Community Livelihoods” on 19-20 April 2016. During this workshop, organized jointly by KLHK, BRG, IUCN, and WRI Indonesia, participants discussed various components of ROAM, i.e. geospatial analysis, diagnosis of key enabling factors for restoration, economic valuation, and finance and resourcing analysis.

The ROAM handbook is now available in Bahasa Indonesia. Further, ROAM and its components are also being tested in a couple of Indonesian landscapes. To obtain more comprehensive feedback on the application of ROAM in the Indonesian context as well as to introduce MEKAR further to stakeholders at the national and local levels, WRI Indonesia and IUCN foresee the need to organize a more advanced workshop on ROAM, where the Bahasa Indonesia version of the ROAM handbook will also be officially launched.

The workshop will also discuss the measures that have and will be taken to help the establishment of a national multi-stakeholder forum on restoration, initiated by WRI Indonesia, IUCN and members of the Indonesia Conservation Communication Forum (FKKI), with the goal to synergize the various restoration commitments and activities in Indonesia. As a first step, WRI Indonesia is preparing a platform that will hold maps and data on restoration potential as well as existing restoration activities conducted by various stakeholders. The platform will also include a monitoring component, such that it may help various parties to monitor the implementation of various restoration pledges and declarations, including those that have been committed to the Bonn Challenge, a global movement to restore 150 million hectares of deforested and degraded before 2020.

Objectives

  • Strengthening support for and synergizing FLR efforts in Indonesia
  • Enriching stakeholders’ knowledge of the various components of ROAM, including in terms of technical know-how
  • Obtaining feedback on the ongoing ROAM implementation in Indonesia, especially in the context of adjusting ROAM into the Indonesian context