Bioenergy for landscape restoration and livelihoods: re-creating energy-smart ecosystems on degraded landscape

Planting bioenergy crops on degraded land can help Indonesia meet its landscape restoration targets and satisfy its growing energy demand. Bioenergy plantations can sequestrate and store carbon, support biodiversity and provide livelihood opportunities in remote and isolated regions. Restoring vast areas degraded land is a costly undertaking, and due to their limited productivity has so far proved unattractive to investors. Establishing bioenergy plantations on degraded land can help offset the high costs involved in meeting land restoration targets without the need to compete for land with food production and can curb unsustainable wood extraction from natural forests. It can also contribute to global restoration goals such as the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration and the Bonn Challenge, as as Indonesia's Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) and commitment to restore 14 million hectares of degraded land by 2030. However, restoring land by growing bioenergy crops is still in its infancy and requires sound science, policy support, practice, guidance and monitoring. Identifying the right trees for the right purpose in the right place, and respecting local rights are key to successful bioenergy plantation development. With support from, and in collaboration with the Republic of Korea's National Institute of Forest Science (NiFoS), Indonesia's Ministry of Environment and Forestry and local partners, CIFOR has been undertaking a range of research activities to address the knowledge-implementation gap. These activities include geospatial analysis and mapping; stakeholder perception analysis; testing, monitoring growth and estimating yield of a variety of tree species on a wide range of degraded landscapes; and other potential environmental and economic benefits.