LEI Congratulates Papua Province!

These spatial plans – and the supporting data and technology to manage them – will prove essential to achieving Indonesia’s forestry, climate change and economic commitments. They also fundamentally recognise the territorial rights and interests of Indonesia’s forest-dwelling and indigenous peoples.

We’ll be sharing much more about the projects achievements in the new year. In the meantime, it’s time to celebrate! LEI would like to add our voice in congratulating Papua Province for receiving the Bhumandala Award from the Indonesian Geospatial Information Agency (BIG – Badan Informasi Geospasial)! This is the highest award available to government institutions, and is awarded for achievements in improving geospatial data management and utilization in Indonesia. It is the very first time that one of the eastern provinces of Indonesia has received this honour.

The award is testament to the hard work of the Papuan Provincial Government. Together with the Papua Spatial Planning (PSP) team, the Papuan geo-portal (SIMTARU) has been significantly improved, and targeted capacity building has been carried out – throughout the COVID period, nonetheless! – to grow and enable a surrounding GIS task force. Data and systems never standalone, and a number of supporting activities were also targeted, including geospatial data standardisation, institution readiness, and availability of local policy related to geospatial data management. All of these efforts will fundamentally lead to improvements to Papuan spatial planning, enabling land use monitoring and evaluation tasks to prevent deforestation. In the province that hosts the largest rainforest cover in Indonesia, with more than 255 tribal groups spread across the region, this is important work indeed.