Total area of Province Lampung is 35,288.35 km2, including 160 islands located in the southeastern tip of Sumatra. Total forest area in Lampung is 1,004,735 hectares, coveringconservation forest 462,030 Ha, Protection Forest 317,615 Ha, Limited Production Forest 33,358 Ha and Production Forest 191,732 Ha.
Figure 1. Map of Lampung Province
(Source: http://www.mapsofworld. om/indonesia/provinces/lampung.html
Figure 2. Map of Lampung’Forest
(Source: Departemen Perkebunan, 1998)
A massive forest exploitation has occurred in Lampung Province in about 1965. Between the years of 1969 to 1970 there were 29 companies that have been exploiting the forest products or logs all around the forest of Lampung. The total area of forest land that is exploited at that time it is 249,200 ha. On 2000 there were 48 permits issued with a total area of 6,850 ha, and in 1980 the number has reached 76 permits. This resulted in a significant increase of critical land area.
In addition to forests clearing by HPH, Lampung Province also has other issues that is encroachment. Most of the encroachers are people from outside Lampung and then stay in the forest, for example from OKI, OKU, West Java, Central Java, and East Java.
Ministry of Forestry of Indonesia has established some programs deal with Tenure Right for Forest Dependent Communities, which are called as Social Forestry program. There are several schemes that has been established, such as Hutan Kemasyarakatan (HKM), Village Forest or Hutan Desa (HD), Hutan Tanaman Rakyat (HTR) or Community Plantation Forest, and Customary Forest (hutan adat)
Lampung Province is decided to be one potential site for this project, due to some reasons:
- Lampung has a long history of HKM implementations. The first-definitive of 35 years-HKM license was issuance since 2000. In the field, Lampung Province has the success story of HKM program. Not only because of the largest HKM area in Indonesia (8.286 ha), but we can find some evidence of the impact of HKM programs. The impact can be found both from community’s livelihood and forest conditions.
- In Lampung province also has been implemented HTR program and Hutan Desa. Even though, both programs are still in the beginning phase.
- Lampung Province also has a specific area of customary forest namely KDTI (Forest Area for Specific Purposes)
