Competition for Kalimantan's Forests

Bacalah dalam bahasa Indonesian.

Kalimantan's forests have become a prime target for tycoons eyeing the carbon business. They are preparing massive projects.

With no road and electricity, the Manarang hamlet is tucked deep in the forest of Lungkuh Layang village, Kapuas Regency, Central Kalimantan. Dozens of families in this isolated enclave have relied on boats their entire lives to reach neighboring villages or towns. The only entry and exit route is the Kapuas River, which cuts through the Timpah subdistrict.

“They have to be relocated so they can use the mining haul road to reach the highway,” said Lungkuh Layang Secretary Rendi Pangalila, when met on Friday, May 9, 2025. Village officials have proposed moving the hamlet to the other side of the Kapuas River, next to Lawang Kamah village.

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But now Rendi is troubled. That plan may fall apart. In mid-2024, residents of Lungkuh Layang received a visit from a company based in Jakarta. The firm, Nusantara Raya Solusi (NRS), came to inform them that the government had issued it a forest concession permit. The designated site for the new hamlet lies within the company’s concession area.

Earlier this year, the company returned to approach the locals again. Just like before, Lungkuh Layang’s residents rejected the proposal. “They initially handed us a memorandum of understanding about the use of our customary land and their carbon trading plan,” said Suriadi, head of Lungkuh Layang village.

Suriadi worries the NRS concession will not just derail the relocation plan for Manarang but also strip the community of its source of livelihood. The forest now designated as a corporate concession is where residents collect rattan and timber. Some also pan for gold traditionally along the riverbanks that border the permit area.

Initially, based on leaked data on Forest Utilization Business License (PBPH) applications, NRS had proposed a 51,880-hectare concession. But records show the Forestry Ministry only approved 39,830 hectares—over half the size of Jakarta—on August 4, 2023.

The concession lies to the north of the Barito River Nature Reserve and Protected Area, spanning eight villages in South Barito Regency and two in Kapuas Regency. NRS is registered to operate environmental service management and the exploitation of non-timber forest products.

On the South Barito side, the concession includes Madara Village in the Dusun Selatan subdistrict. Some villagers there have long farmed one to two hectares of land now falling inside the company’s permit area. Unlike in Lungkuh Layang, Madara residents agreed to welcome the company. They were promised Rp5,000 (around US$0.30) per tree planted within the concession. “But nothing’s clear yet,” said Urau bin Lewis, head of the neighborhood unit 2 in Madara. “In fact, they’re telling us to buy cocoa seedlings for Rp1,000 (US$0.06) each.”

Despite having secured the permit for some time, NRS has made little headway with its operations. According to the Verra Carbon website—a verification and validation body for the voluntary carbon market—the company is behind the proposed South Barito Kapuas Project. The carbon project is being developed in collaboration with the Research and Community Service Institute (LPPM) of Palangka Raya University and several foreign organizations.

A businessman and researcher familiar with the carbon project said the South Barito Kapuas Project is facing two major hurdles: resistance from communities in several villages and uncertainty over funding. The lack of consent from potentially affected residents became a stumbling block for NRS as it sought to bring in an investor from Singapore.

Initially, NRS was not part of any major conglomerate. The majority of its shares were held by Hamparan Eco Semesta, which is affiliated with the Hamparan Eco Semesta Foundation, a nonprofit forest conservation institution founded by Nova Misriani. Nova has also been listed as a board member in a timber company.

Recently, however, NRS reportedly has acquired a new partner. According to the two sources, the company has teamed up with Megain Widjaja, grandson of Sinar Mas Group founder Eka Tjipta Widjaja. Megain is known as the owner of Bursa Komoditi dan Derivatif Indonesia (ICDX), a commodity futures exchange whose ownership ultimately traces back to the Widjaja family’s business empire.

Tempo’s sources say NRS’s carbon project is also expected to receive support from a British firm. Its interest was piqued by NRS’s claim that it had secured a potential carbon credit buyer. “The carbon buyer will be a Singapore-based coal mining company that has long sourced coal from Indonesia,” one source said.

Tempo sought comments from Nova Misriani and Megain Widjaja about the carbon business partnership within NRS’s concession area via their listed phone numbers. Neither responded to questions.

When visited at the company’s project office in South Barito on Wednesday, May 7, 2025, NRS General Manager Aswin Usup advised Tempo to contact the company’s Jakarta headquarters for details on its partnership with the Widjaja family. Aswin would only comment on the company’s efforts to carry out its project design document (PDD). “We’ve built 23 bore wells in peatland areas that used to be prone to fires,” said Aswin, who formerly headed the LPPM at Palangka Raya University.

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KALIMANTAN, the vast tropical rainforest region that has suffered the highest deforestation rate in Indonesia over the past two decades, is now emerging as a new hotspot for forestry permit seekers. Leaked data on PBPH applications reveal that, as of the end of 2023, at least 76 companies have applied for licenses targeting a combined area of 1.98 million hectares across Kalimantan.

A majority of newly issued permits in the past two years are also located in Kalimantan. Many of these companies are believed to be entering carbon trade.

According to a carbon credit entrepreneur, Kalimantan’s forests have long been under pressure from various extractive industries, such as timber, palm oil plantations, and coal mining. These have made reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the region particularly challenging. However, in the carbon market, the more threatened the forest, the more valuable it becomes.

“But because there’s so much to be done for restoration and other efforts, it takes a huge amount of funding,” the entrepreneur said. “And carbon projects are long-term. Fast results are impossible.”

As a result, large-scale carbon projects have begun cropping up across Kalimantan. In Central Kalimantan alone, three companies—Indika Ekosistem Khatulistiwa (IEK), Permata Wana Lestari (PWL), and Persada Hutan Mandiri (PHM)—received new PBPH permits on November 22, 2024. Combined, their concessions span roughly 150,000 hectares.

Company registry documents show direct or indirect links between all three companies and Halim Rusli, the founder of Integra Indocabinet, also known as the Integra Group, a timber business from upstream to downstream. IEK, for instance, is owned by Belayan River Timber, a subsidiary of Integra (listed under the stock ticker WOOD). Belayan River Timber also holds shares in Ekosistem Alam Sejahtera, another company currently applying for a new concession covering 31,500 hectares in Kapuas Regency.

“All of these PBPH entities are planned to be part of the Nusantara Climate Initiative carbon project,” said a carbon businessman on Wednesday, May 28, 2025.

The Nusantara Climate Initiative project is being developed by Nusantara Climate Initiative Indonesia. According to the company’s website, it is running three carbon projects on existing Integra Group concessions, including mangrove ecosystem restoration by Kandelia Alam and forest protection efforts by Narkata Rimba. Environment Ministry documents show that Kandelia Alam’s carbon project is projected to enter the carbon trading market within the year, with a potential yield of 19.02 million tons of CO2 equivalent (CO2e) from 2022 to 2031.

The corporate deed of Nusantara Climate Initiative Indonesia lists Halim Rusli as a commissioner, while the director is Barakalla Robyn. According to a carbon industry source, Barakalla has frequently represented the business group in meetings with both the Ministry of Environment and the Ministry of Forestry.

Tempo sought clarification from Integra Group through Asep Taufik Hidayat, head of Audit and Compliance at Nusantara Climate Initiative Indonesia. He gave a brief response to Tempo’s interview request and list of questions. “I’ve forwarded it to our communications department,” Asep said on Wednesday, May 28, 2025.

A separate request for comment was also sent to the official email address of Integra Indocabinet listed on the Bursa Efek Indonesia website. As of this report’s publication, neither Nusantara Climate nor Integra had responded further.

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NOT all companies applying for PBPH permits and linked to large business groups have secured approval from the Forestry Ministry. These include Alam Teduh Sentosa (ATS), Alam Belantara Makmur (ABM), Belantara Alam Makmur (BAM), Belantara Sejahtera Mandiri (BSM), and Borneo Konservasi Restorasi (BKR), all of which are believed to be affiliated with the Triputra Group. The five firms are seeking licenses for a combined area of 161,850 hectares across seven locations in Central and West Kalimantan.

Corporate records from the Law Ministry show that the beneficial owners of all five companies are Like Rani Imanto and Meity Subianto. Like Rani Imanto is the wife of Theodore Permadi Rachmat, Indonesia’s 16th richest individual, according to Forbes, and founder of the Triputra Group. Meity Subianto is the wife of the late businessman Benny Subianto, a long-time business associate of Theodore.

Like and Meity are also currently listed as the beneficial owners of Triputra Agro Persada (TAPG), the primary plantation and palm oil processing company within the Triputra Group. TAPG, which trades under the symbol TAPG on the Indonesia Stock Exchange, is listed as a shareholder of Alam Teduh Sentosa, which in turn owns Belantara Sejahtera Mandiri and Alam Belantara Makmur.

Like and Meity did not respond to Tempo’s interview request, which was also sent to Triputra Agro. However, Triputra Agro Persada’s corporate secretary, Joni Tjeng, confirmed that entities affiliated with TAPG were in the process of applying for forest utilization permits, specifically ATS, ABM, and BSM.

“They are currently submitting applications for multi-business forestry permits through the PBPH scheme,” Joni wrote in a statement received on Wednesday, May 28, 2025. He did not clarify the status of BAM and BKR within the Triputra Group.

Joni explained that companies requesting PBPH, which are affiliated with TAPG, plan to engage in environmental protection and ecosystem restoration activities. “This includes supporting Indonesia’s emission reduction targets in the forestry and other land use (FOLU) sector,” he said. Joni also emphasized that Triputra applies the principle of free, prior, and informed consent (FPIC).