The Promise and Pitfalls of Landscape Approaches to Palm Oil Development in Central Kalimantan Indonesia

One of the post promising initiatives focused on jurisdictional landscape approaches to supporting the sustainable palm oil transition in Indonesia is the Terpercaya initiative. Initially funded and supported by the European Forest Institute’s EU REDD facility and Inovasi Bumi (INOBU), the initiative focused on the antecedents required for developing a jurisdictional approach to sustainable palm oil in Central Kalimantan. At the first phase, a classification of what constitutes a jurisdictional approach in an Indonesian context were developed. In addition, a set of twenty-two indicators were established to support the selection and development of jurisdictional test sites for scaling the production of sustainable palm oil as well as other agricultural commodities.

To develop a deeper understanding of landscape approaches, using Central Kalimantan, and specifically the Terpercaya initiative as a case of strategic importance, we propose a research project consisting of three work packages. Each work package will be carried out in the Kotawaringan Barat and Seruyan districts, two areas piloting jurisdictional approaches to sustainable palm oil, as well as Katingan and Pulang Pisau, two districts that, while hosting considerable palm oil plantation areas, are not pilot districts.