Arya News - Two officials have raised a plan to recruit 70,000 new forest rangers across the country to prevent illegal logging, forest encroachment and other forest crimes.
JAKARTA – The government’s plan to recruit thousands of forest rangers to combat forest crimes has been met with doubts over their authority in safeguarding forests, with questions lingering over efforts to rein in extractive businesses that have devastated swaths of the country’s remaining forests.
The move was first announced in early February by Special Presidential Envoy on Energy and the Environment Hashim Djojohadikusumo, who is also the younger brother of President Prabowo Subianto .
Hashim said the President had agreed to recruit 70,000 people to expand the number of forest rangers safeguarding national parks, protected areas and other vital areas. The country currently has 4,800 rangers, which according to him is insufficient to protect the forests.
The plan was reiterated by Forestry Minister Raja Juli Antoni on Feb. 19, who said his ministry aimed to close the gap between the existing number of forest rangers and its ideal figure to safeguard the country’s 125 million hectares of forest.
He added that the ideal ratio should have been one ranger for every 2,500 ha, a total of 70,000 rangers.
The current size of the force leaves each ranger to guard 25,000 ha of forest, an area one-third the size of Jakarta. He also noted that regions like Aceh only have 63 personnel to oversee its 3.5 million ha of forest.
“I’ve met the President twice and he has agreed to increase the number of forest rangers,” Raja Juli said, as quoted by state news agency Antara.
Forest rangers are civil servants employed under the Forestry Ministry tasked with conducting regular patrols, preventing environmental crimes such as illegal logging and forest encroachment, as well as enforcing the law in the area of their regional offices, including in protected forests, national parks and other key conservation sites.
But many regions face staff shortages, including heavily forested provinces such as West Papua, South Papua and North Kalimantan, each of which has fewer than 100 rangers.
Misplaced priority
Forestry Ministry spokesperson Ristianto Pribadi said the initiative was designed to “gradually and closely” enhance forest protection in Indonesia, with priority areas including those vulnerable to encroachment, illegal logging and tenurial conflicts.
“The Forestry Ministry, along with relevant ministries and state agencies, is still conducting a comprehensive study to determine the actual manpower needs, budget allocations, recruitment channels and the launch date,” Ristianto said on Wednesday.
Between January and October 2025, the ministry claimed to have prosecuted 34 suspects in 21 illegal logging cases, while raiding 13 illegal mining sites. Authorities confirmed to have thwarted 36 attempts at smuggling protected wildlife.
But the plan to recruit thousands of forest rangers demonstrated the government’s “ perception” that forest destruction is mainly driven by illegal activities, said Mufti Fathul Barri, researcher with Forest Watch Indonesia (FWI).
In reality, according to Mufti, the majority of forest degradation takes place within legally sanctioned business concessions, where environmental oversight is still relatively lacking.
As of 2025, the government had issued concessions covering 55.3 million ha of forest and other lands, according to the forest watchdog’s research.
“The government appears to be adopting an approach that presents local communities as a threat to the forests so that they must be monitored, while it also keeps overlooking industry and big corporations,” Mufti said on Wednesday.
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While adding more forest rangers was vital, he added that the government should prioritize engaging local people and indigenous communities in its work in the forests, rather than the mass recruitment of rangers.
“The plan actually exposes that community collaboration in managing the forests is not in place,” Mufti went on to say. “If the collaboration was running well, you wouldn’t need so many new rangers.”