Water is the argument
Thirty million people live downstream of West Java's remaining montane forest. The case for keeping it is made in water, and it wins locally.
West Java has less forest left than any other programme province, and more people relying on what remains. The montane blocks sit on steep volcanic slopes above towns, reservoirs and irrigated rice, and about thirty million people downstream depend on the water they hold.
That makes this landscape different from the peat provinces. Here the argument for standing forest is made in clean water, not carbon, and it is the easiest argument to win in a village.
Here the case for standing forest is made in water.
Rules the villages wrote
The programme works at the forest edge, where villages farm right up to the boundary. The boundary is marked and agreed with each bordering village, and the agreed line is recorded in a document the village holds. Catchment protection rules are written by the villages rather than for them.
Upper catchment under village protection rules
Twelve village regulations have been adopted so far.
