| Civil Servants |
| As part of the province of West Sumatra, Siberut receives its share of |
| provincial and national governmental attention. First of all this is through the regular, all Indonesian programmes in the field of education, local administration, communication, health care, and agriculture. But because of its isolated position, the implementation of these programmes is somewhat different from that on the mainland. But second and more important is that Siberut deviates from the rest of West Sumatra because of the nature of its population which is classified as different from the rest of the province. This has given rise to special programmes which are being implemented by the Department of Social Affairs. |
| In order to implement all these programmes numerous civil servants |
| are sent to Siberut in order to serve their term on the island. Policemen, teachers, nurses, and civil servants from various departments are transfered to the island. Most of them are stationed in the two main harbour villages, Muara Sikabaluan and Muara Siberut, which are the centres for the two kecamatan on the island (North and South Siberut). Generally civil servants consider the transfer to the island as a necessity which they have to accept as part of their civil servant (pegawai negeri) position. Most of them look forward to the day they can return to the mainland or tanah tepi as they call it.14 |
| These employees are provided with local housing. Almost all civil |
| servants are of Minangkabau origin: this is to be explained by the fact that the West Sumatra is dominated by the Minangkabau and so far very few Mentawaians have achieved the necessary level of education to fulfill the requirements for these positions.15 |
| Within the context of this paper I would like to focus on two |
| departments in particular because they deal with the ‘wildness’ and ‘wilderness’ aspects of the island. |
| Defining Wildness: Social Affairs |
| The native population of Siberut is officially classified as masyarakat |
| terasing (isolated people), a category of people which deserves special attention according to the policies of the government. Although the entire population of the Mentawai Archipelago was classified as such but over the years, the focus of attention has been on the people of Siberut only. |
| Though the population of Siberut was already classified as an |
| isolated ethnic group in the ’50s, it was not until 1972 that the special development programme designed for these tribal people started its first project. This ‘civilization and development’-programme as developed by the Department of Social Affairs, aims to integrate all isolated people in Indonesia into the mainstream of social and cultural life. It aims to turn the ‘wild’, isolated, backward and hinterland people into modern Indonesian citizens. The classification of a particular group of people as an isolated group is based on a number of criteria like religion, food patterns, settlements, housing, and world view. The development programma to integrate these people into the mainstream is implemented through resettlement projects in which all- encompassing development activities are executed over a period of five to seven years. These include sedentary agriculture, health care, education, and religious activities16. Over the years 23 projects have been implemented affecting the lifes of more than 7000 people or about one third of the island’s population. |
| Though the programme for the isolated tribes is a Jakarta initiated |
| and financed programme, the provincial department plays a very crucial role. Basic decisions as to which people are classified as masyarakat terasing are taken at the provincial level in the first place. It is also the provincial department (of Social Affairs) which initiates the first activities like the field surveys. It is again the provincial department which determines the targets, and which implements its policies. Proposals for projects are forwarded to Jakarta for agreement and financing. Also the programme of implementation is run from the provincial office. And after termination of the project the settlement is officially handed over to the provincial administration. To some extent one could say that it the provincial and in this case Minangkabau version of the centrally designed development policies which is of crucial importance for the Mentawaians on Siberut. |
| Probably the best illustration of this provincial view is an official |
| evaluation on a particular project by the department itself. This evaluation provides a clear image of how one perceives the original situation and the ideal situation after termination of the projects. Though this evaluation is said to be based on field surveys I do not want to discuss the emperical evidence on which it is based. Here the evaluation is merely used to present the kind of images, contrasts and concepts that are employed in this context (see tabel 1). |
| The evaluation describes the initial situation stressing the |
| ‘uncivilized’, ‘wild’ of ‘close to nature’ aspects of the traditional life of the Mentawaians. The project is considered to have brought an enormous change in almost all aspects of life within a period of five to seven years. To mention here just one example: with regard to the livelihood the villagers are said to have moved from forest products and hunting and uncultivated foods to sedentary agriculture and wet rice cultivation. The interventions are supposed to have led the Mentawaians away from wildness and wilderness to civilization, domestication and integration in the mainstream of Indonesian social and cultural life. It is the intention of the Department of Social Affairs to extend this programme until all people of Siberut have been reached and ‘educated’ (dibina)(Departmen Sosial 1996). Defining Wilderness: Forestry |
| Views regarding the value of the wilderness conditions on Siberut |
| have not been consistent over the years. They have moved from large scale logging operations in the early ’70s to the establishment of a National Park in 1993. But parallel and underneath this dominant development there have always been forces moving in opposite directions. |
| In the early ’70s almost the entire forest of Siberut was granted to a |
| number of logging companies based on the idea that all forest resources land belonged to the state. This new phase was announced as offering a new prospect for Mentawai. The traditional export products of sago and rattan were no longer in great demand: it was thought that sago was replaced by other products in the food industry and that plastic would replace rattan. The prospect of exporting large quantities of valuable wood, also called ‘the mining of the green gold’ (tambang emas hijau), was thought to lead Siberut and the other Mentawaian Islands out of their state of backwardness (Aneka |
| Minang 1972)(see map 2). |
| According to the local people however there is no empty land on the |
| island. The whole island, including also the primary forest, is divided among the umaF. The local people however were not able to resist the logging companies from moving in. The local administration backed up by the police force was avalaible to support the operations of the logging companies. |
| In 1976 a small reserve area of 6,500 was established in the middle |
| of the island, called Teitei Batti. Through the efforts of World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and heavily supported by the Minister for the Environment, Emil Salim, this reserve area was extended up to 132,900 in 1982 Through the international interest in Siberut, based on the endemic species and the unique population, Siberut was even officially declared a Man and Biosphere reserve in 1981 by UNESCO in Paris. However once the involvement in the field of international organisations like WWF and Survival International had come to an end in 1982, logging went on with little respect for the reserve boundaries. The Indonesian Department for Nature Conservation could not cope with the strenght of the companies. |
| There is a big difference between civil servants employed in |
| departments which are basically interested in stimulating or facilitating money generating activities, like agriculture, and forestry on the one hand and civil servants in the Department for Nature Conservation on the other. The latter are always forced into in a defensive role. They have to protect forest or biodiversity from encroaching farmers, companies or estates. |
| The first group of people want to convert the forest in more |
| profitable and practical uses, like agriculture or estates for industrial crops. To them wilderness represents primarily a wealth of untapped resources waiting to be utilized or marketed. They look down on environmental concerns for wilderness protection and they are not easily impressed by arguments for biodiversity conservation or degrees of primate endemism. Moreover they feel that the local people should be uplifted from their state of backwardness and ignorance and large scale conversion of forest land and immigration of people with a superior culture were suggested to be proper ways to achieve this. |
| As a consequence of this a number of other initiatives have been |
| taken in the past two decades. Plans were designed for establishment of transmigration sites on Siberut, as well as oil palm plantations. Since the late sixties Siberut has been mentioned in the potential sites for transmigration sites within the province of West Sumatra. For a variety of reasons these were never materialised however18. In 1991 the plans to establish a 250,000 ha oil palm plantation on the island gave rise to a wide discussion in which foreign organisations actively participated. Because of lack of infrastructure for fresh water supply, adequate harbour facilities and a number of other reasons, these plans were cancelled however. |
| In 1992, and much to the surprise of many conservationists in |
| Indonesia as well as elsewhere, President Suharto announced the establisment of a National Park of the island and cancellation of all logging concessions. And so it happened. Logging equipment, chain saws, trucs and bulldozers were withdrawn from the island and the former logging camps were either gradually overgrown or they were occupied by local people, who had already cleared fields close to the camps. For a couple of years the threat of establishment of a large oil palm plantation was no longer there. On the contrary action was taken to implement the National Park on the island. Part of a large loan of the Asian Development Bank for biodiversity conservation in Indonesia was used for its implementation in addition to the allocation of funds from the government of Indonesia itself. The implementation of this project is on its way at this moment. It is based on a totally different conception of the value of ‘wild nature’ (Ministry of Forestry 1995; see also map 3). |
| However in the second half of 1996, while the National Park |
| Headquarters in Maileppet in the south of Siberut, were about to be finished, the decision of the provincial governor was announced that a local firm had obtained permission to clear forest land in order to establish an oil palm plantation. Prior to final permission the company has already started a process of buying land from individual uma. Warranted by this process a Padang-based NGO, called Yayasan Lembaga Bantuan Hukum Indonesia (Foundation for Legal Help) informed the local people through the village heads not to accept any offer unless there is clarity regarding the real impact of this development.19 |
| Early 1996 this transmigration issue was brought up again by the |
| Minister of Transmigration after meeting the President. ‘Jakarta’ wanted to |
| resume its programme to open up new settlement areas on Siberut ‘in an effort to bring the largely backward island into the modern civilization’. This project was said to be shelved in the 1980s because of strong objections from environmental groups who were concerned about the impact that the settlers would have on the islanders. But ‘recent studies20 found that these concerns were unfounded and that keeping the island isolated meant keeping them in a state of backwardness”. The minister also stated that: “Siberut Island is even more backward than most areas in eastern Indonesia, with inhabitants still living very much in a by gone era. Obviously we cannot leave them in that state.” (Jakarta Post 14 February, 1996). |
| At the moment it is unclear as to what kind of decisions will be taken |
| in the near future. The decision is up to the Minister of Forestry as he is officially the one who cancelled the logging concessions on the island, who established the National Park and it should also be him to change the status of the area adjacent to the National Park to be converted into the oil palm estate. In the meantime however it is being argued by the representative of the Asian Development Bank that you can not have a large National Park on the one hand and oil palm or other estastes adjacent to it. Migrant workers and local people will gradually put more pressure on the park’s resources. Maintaining a well protected area will almost be impossible. Based on this argument the Asian Development Bank is likely to withdraw its support for the project if the land is being released for this purpose. The Joint Definition of Wildness and Wilderness: Tourism |
| Based on the more or less spontaneous development of tourism since |
| the late ’80s, the Department of Tourism has also officially adopted its position with regard to Siberut as a tourist destination. The emphasis of the provincial tourist board has always been on the unique Minangkabau culture, its matrilineal character and on its material manifestations, like the extended houses with roofs shaped like the horns of a buffalo, the music and the dances in colourful customs. The scenic setting of the Minangkabau culture in the heartland with the two volcanos, two beautiful lakes and the rice terraces, added to the touristic value of the province. Since the success of the spontaneously developed backpack tourism to Siberut, the department is now echoing the slogans of the Bukittinggi-based tourist guides with catch words |