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Six timber concessionaires in Indonesia's Kalimantan are making a push for green certification, a move they say will not only help preserve the nation’s forests but also ensure their companies survive as viable long-term organizations.

“We don’t want to be a short-lived company looking for a quick profit,” Bambang Poerwanto, production director of PT Roda MasTimber Kalimantan, said recently. “The main benefit for getting certified as green is the long-term survival of our companies.”

Bambang said that managing the production process in a sustainable fashion would help preserves the forests and gives employees job security. “The certification also gives our product added value and increases our ability to attract buyers,” he said.

The concessionaires have signed a memorandum of understanding with The Borneo Initiative (TBI), a Dutch-based nongovernmental organization involved in sustainable forest management that will give the companies financial support in their quest to be certified by the Indonesian Ecolabeling Foundation.

“TBI will be assisting us in the preaudit phase, consultation and the final audit. We can do the certification process ourselves but it’s difficult and very time-consuming,” Bambang said.

The Borneo Initiative’s aim is to encourage green certifications for forests in Indonesia, starting in Kalimantan. Jesse Kuijper, a member of the group’s board, said it was crucial for Indonesia to focus on sustainable forest management at this point in time.

“There is a growing trend for larger European and American companies … to feel more secure when [timber products] have been acquired in a legal way, and preferably in a sustainable way,” he said.

Kuijper said that from a cost-benefit perspective, it was more expensive in the long run if things were not done in a sustainable manner.

“[Sustainability] is very, very profitable in the long term, even though there are some short-term costs. For instance, you would need to be logging a little bit less than you have done in the past,” he said, adding that as an extra incentive, certified companies could get higher prices for their products.

Rizal Bukhari, director of TBI’s Indonesian office, said on Tuesday that his organization would provide funding to the concessionaires to help them obtain certification.

“Based on our research, concessionaires are very interested [in getting certified] if they get professional support and financial aid,” Rizal said. “The financial support will be given so the companies can pay third parties, such as forest experts and consultants.”

TBI will subsidize the certification process with a maximum 180,000 euros ($262,000) for each of the concessionaires’ 135,000 hectares, with the remainder to be financed by the concessionaires themselves.

Kuijper said TBI’s objective was to overcome any obstacles that blocked the companies from getting certified, including financial issues, knowledge of the process, the various institutions that need to be dealt with and information about those in the market for sustainable products.

“When we first came here, there was no overall approach [to cover all those issues]. Everybody did a part of the process but nothing was really connected,” Kuijper said.

Bambang said his company had been planning to get certified since 2001 but was forced to delay the process because of economic issues, including wildly fluctuating wood prices.

The other concessionaires seeking certification are Sarang Sapta Putera, Belayan River Timber, Indexim Utama Corporation, Suka Jaya Makmur and Sarmiento Parakanca Timber.

Bambang said his company already had certification for another concession and had received approval from the government for its annual work plan validation (known as RKT). Once certified, he said, it will no longer be necessary to get the plan approved by local governments.

“Of course, that comes with consequences — if we are proven to have violated the plan, then we will face heavy penalties,” he said.

Art Klassen, regional director for Southeast Asia Pacific at the Tropical Forest Foundation, said the best guarantee for forest conservation in the country was to put it in the hands of responsible companies that would implement sustainable forest management practices according to credible standards.

“I’ve been coming to Indonesia for more than 14 years now, working with some of the companies here, and the forests they still run today are the same as they were 14 years ago because they are responsible and care for the forests,” he said.

About one million hectares of forest have already been certified in Indonesia, of which 600,000 hectares are located in Kalimantan. The government’s projection for 2013 is to have 3.3 million hectares certified as sustainable and five million by 2015.