Empowered lives. Resilient nations. COMMUNITY-BASED MARINE MANAGEMENT FOUNDATION Indonesia Equator Initiative Case Studies Local sustainable development solutions for people, nature, and resilient communities UNDP EQUATOR INITIATIVE CASE STUDY SERIES Local and indigenous communities across the world are advancing innovative sustainable development solutions that work for people and for nature. Few publications or case studies tell the full story of how such initiatives evolve, the breadth of their impacts, or how they change over time. Fewer still have undertaken to tell these stories with community practitioners themselves guiding the narrative. To mark its 10-year anniversary, the Equator Initiative aims to fill this gap. The following case study is one in a growing series that details the work of Equator Prize winners – vetted and peer-reviewed best practices in community-based environmental conservation and sustainable livelihoods. These cases are intended to inspire the policy dialogue needed to take local success to scale, to improve the global knowledge base on local environment and development solutions, and to serve as models for replication. Case studies are best viewed and understood with reference to ‘The Power of Local Action: Lessons from 10 Years of the Equator Prize’, a compendium of lessons learned and policy guidance that draws from the case material. Click on the map to visit the Equator Initiative’s searchable case study database. Editors Editor-in-Chief: Joseph Corcoran Managing Editor: Oliver Hughes Contributing Editors: Dearbhla Keegan, Matthew Konsa, Erin Lewis, Whitney Wilding Contributing Writers Edayatu Abieodun Lamptey, Erin Atwell, Toni Blackman, Jonathan Clay, Joseph Corcoran, Larissa Currado, Sarah Gordon, Oliver Hughes, Wen-Juan Jiang, Sonal Kanabar, Dearbhla Keegan, Matthew Konsa, Rachael Lader, Patrick Lee, Erin Lewis, Jona Liebl, Mengning Ma, Mary McGraw, Gabriele Orlandi, Brandon Payne, Juliana Quaresma, Peter Schecter, Martin Sommerschuh, Whitney Wilding, Luna Wu Design Oliver Hughes, Dearbhla Keegan, Matthew Konsa, Amy Korngiebel, Kimberly Koserowski, Erin Lewis, John Mulqueen, Lorena de la Parra, Brandon Payne, Mariajosé Satizábal G. Acknowledgements The Equator Initiative acknowledges with gratitude the Community-Based Marine Management Foundation, and the guidance and inputs of Sandra Tjan, Indonesian LMMA Network. All photo credits courtesy of the Community-Based Marine Management Foundation. Maps courtesy of CIA World Factbook and Wikipedia. Suggested Citation United Nations Development Programme. 2012. Community-Based Marine Management Foundation, Indonesia. Equator Initiative Case Study Series. New York, NY. COMMUNITY-BASED MARINE MANAGEMENT FOUNDATION Indonesia PROJECT SUMMARY KEY FACTS The Community-based Marine Management Foundation coordinates conservation, environmental education and EQUATOR PRIZE WINNER: 2008 livelihoods programming centred on locally-managed marine areas in 26 sites across eastern Indonesia. Among its FOUNDED: 2003 innovative conservation work, the foundation has supported villages in the Padaido Islands to use GPS technologies LOCATION: Eastern Indonesia, based on Biak island to map local marine resources, helping them to resist the destructive effects of commercial fishing companies. BENEFICIARIES: Fishing communities The foundation has also has mainstreamed environmental BIODIVERSITY: 26 Locally Managed Marine Areas education into schools in five different regions of Indonesia, through the design of unique conservation modules for 27 primary schools, each focusing on the species of greatest importance to the local people. In Jayapura, meanwhile, fishers have become proficient in developing home- made Fish Aggregation Devices to improve fish catches. These traditional and modern approaches have brought substantial benefits to member communities, and have often led to their adoption by local government. TABLE OF CONTENTS Background and Context 4 Key Activities and Innovations 6 Biodiversity Impacts 10 Socioeconomic Impacts 11 Policy Impacts 12 Sustainability 13 Partners 13 3 Background and Context The Republic of Indonesia’s 17,508 islands support the world’s Yayasan Pengelolaan Lokal Kawasan Laut (PLKL) grew quickly within second-highest level of biodiversity after Brazil, and are second only eastern Indonesia to encompass other areas of Papua, West Papua, and to Australia in terms of endemism, with 36% of their 1,531 species the Maluku Islands. While the catalyst for its formation was declining of bird and 39% of their 515 species of mammal being endemic. fish species numbers, the group was also founded to address the The country has a range of marine and coastal ecosystems along its need to secure local communities’ rights to access and sustainably 50,000 miles of coastline, including beaches, sand dunes, estuaries, manage their natural resources. The organization’s initial goal was mangroves, coral reefs, sea grass beds, coastal mudflats, tidal flats, to create and share a community-based, sustainable, and equitable algal beds, and small island ecosystems. The islands form part of marine resources management model for the coastal areas and small the Coral Triangle, an area containing the world’s greatest diversity islands of eastern Indonesia. This has comprised strengthening local of coral reef fish, with more than 1,650 species in eastern Indonesia institutions, supporting community-based conservation activities, alone. The threats of over-fishing and warming, acidifying, and rising assisting communities to use marine resources sustainably, and oceans have made the country a priority for marine conservation developing locally-relevant environmental education programmes. programmes. Despite having the largest economy in Southeast Asia, 13.3% of Indonesia’s 238 million people were living below the poverty line in 2010; many live in remote provinces with poor infrastructure and low levels of human development, relying on subsistence agriculture and artisanal fishing for their livelihoods. Devolving marine management to coastal communities The locally-managed marine area approach was first introduced in Indonesia as a solution to the threat of declining marine resources in 2003. During the late 1990s, the World Wildlife Fund’s Biodiversity Conservation Network worked closely with two local NGOs in the Padaido Islands, north of Papua, to promote community-based coastal management by establishing an ecotourism venture. This effort subsequently involved the Indonesian Environmental Conservation Foundation (Yayasan KEHATI). The experience of involving local communities in the conservation and sustainable use of marine resources led to the formation in 2003 of the Community- based Marine Management Foundation (Yayasan Pengelolaan Lokal Kawasan Laut), based on the island of Biak. This brought together conservation professionals, academics from Cenderawasih University, and local people in an attempt to regulate over-fishing through community engagement. 4 PLKL works alongside local communities to establish locally- managed marine areas in which fishing is regulated by zones. These regulations generally include seasonal fishing and harvesting restrictions, bans on destructive fishing methods such as the use of explosives, and establishing Marine Protected Areas that function as permanent no-take zones. The basis for these regulations has been the revival of a traditional resource management system known as sasi; the reintroduction of this community-based approach to regulating fishing practices aims at both conserving certain key species and ecosystems and sustainably managing fishing stocks for local fishermen. As of 2011, PLKL had assisted in establishing 26 fully operational Locally-Managed Marine Areas (LMMAs). Their work has led to the substantial recovery of key species populations and increases in fishing stocks. Alongside its marine management work, PLKL has also worked closely with universities and schools to develop environmental curricula that raise awareness of important local conservation priorities and promote effective marine resource management. In total, PLKL is currently engaged in more than 50 conservation, education and livelihoods projects. Partnerships with the World Wildlife Foundation and The Nature Conservancy have allowed the organization to substantially and rapidly increase its influence within eastern Indonesia since 2007 through the replication of its LMMA and educational models. PLKL has also played a key role in the LMMA Network in southern Asia and the Pacific, working closely with LMMA projects in the Philippines, Palau, the Federated States of Micronesia, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Fiji, and Vanuatu. Fig. 1: Community-Based Marine Management Foundation sites Source: Community-Based Marine Management Foundation 5 Key Activities and Innovations PLKL’s activities are categorized into three programme areas: as community outreach and organizing; participatory planning; conservation, environmental education, and livelihoods. identification of the community’s vision, target resources, threats, and solutions; development of measurable objectives; community Conservation Programme mapping of natural resources; and creation of culturally appropriate and scientifically valid LMMAs andsasi areas. PLKL also facilitates The conservation programme consists of establishing Locally- networking and knowledge sharing between the different LMMA Managed Marine Areas in partnership with community-based sites. This is conducted through