Batak woman from Sumatra among environmentalists' 'nobels
Delima Silalahi, 46, received the Goldman Prize for the battle that enabled six tribes to regain possession of more than 17,000 acres of forest that a large pulp and paper company was turning into a eucalyptus plantation. Due to forest and peatland fires, Indonesia is among the countries believed to be most responsible for the increase in greenhouse gases.
San Francisco (AsiaNews/Agencies) - Delima Silalahi - an Indonesian woman from the Batak ethnic groups of North Tapanuli district in North Sumatra - is one of the six winners announced yesterday of the 2023 edition of the Goldman Prize, the world's most important award related to environmental protection.
Delima Silalahi, who is 46 years old and the executive director of the NGO Kelompok Studi dan Pengembangan Prakarsa Masyarakat (KSPPM), was honoured for leading a campaign to secure land rights over 17,824 acres of tropical forest for six indigenous communities in North Sumatra.
Her community activism reclaimed this land from a pulp and paper company that had partially converted it into an industrial eucalyptus plantation. Now that the six communities have regained ownership, they have begun to restore native forest species in the area.
Indonesia is one of the countries with the greatest responsibility for the increase in greenhouse gases due to the cutting and burning of forests and peatlands for the creation of industrial plantations,' the Goldman Award promoters remind us in the explanatory statement.
Between 2015 and 2019, fires burned 10.8 million acres of forests and peatlands, an area larger than the entire expanse of the Netherlands. At the same time, Indonesia has the third largest area of rainforest in the world, which can store huge amounts of carbon, essential to combat climate change.
In recent years, Toba Pulp Lestari (TPL), a pulp and paper company, has encroached on the forests of North Sumatra. When local communities protested the destruction of their forests, the company called the police, who dispersed and forcibly arrested the protesters.
In 2013, a Constitutional Court ruling confirmed that customary forests are not state forests, giving Indonesia's indigenous peoples the chance to claim legal management of their traditional territories. Deeply concerned about the massive expropriation of indigenous territories for the pulp and paper industry - and its huge impact on the forests of the Lake Toba region - Delima and her KSPPM team began organising local communities to claim their rights.
She travelled from village to village educating communities, despite the fact that in Tano Batak communities women are often excluded from decision-making. In February 2022, thanks to the efforts of Delima and her community, the Indonesian government granted six Tano Batak communities the legal management of 17,824 acres of their traditional forests. Delima and the KSPPM support the communities in reforestation and ecosystem restoration, increasing the tree cover of the forests and their natural resilience to climate.
In addition to Delima Silalahi, the Goldman Prize 2023 was awarded to activists Zafer Kizilkaya (Turkey), Alessandra Korap Munduruku (Brazil), Chilekwa Mumba (Zambia), Tero Mustonen (Finland) and Diane Wilson (USA).
Photo: Edward Tigor/Goldman Price
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07/09/2019 08:00
17/09/2022 12:54
