In 2015, forest and land fires that occurred in Indonesia caused multi-sectoral losses. The fires burned around 2.6 million hectares of forest and land, 35 percent of them were peatlands. The World Bank analyzed that the economic loss due to the haze disaster was estimated at IDR 221 trillion.
After the fire, the Indonesian government strengthened several regulations on the protection and management of peatlands. President Joko Widodo also established an ad-hoc agency, i.e. Peat Restoration Agency (BRG). This agency focuses on the restoration of degraded peat ecosystems from 2016 to 2020 in seven priority provinces, i.e. Riau, Jambi, South Sumatra, West Kalimantan, Central Kalimantan, South Kalimantan, Papua.
Actually, with or without BRG’s existence, it is the Ministry of Environment and Forestry's task to restore peat ecosystems through the Directorate of Peat Degradation Control. Before the big fires in 2015, the Directorate's main activity was to restore peatlands.
Let's take a look at the Indonesian Government’s commitment to the development of policies for the restoration and protection of peat ecosystems.