Indonesian peatlands store eighty percent of national soil organic carbon. Peat-related greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have been estimated to be responsible for at least thirty eight percent of total national greenhouse gases.

Peatland rewetting and other restoration action helps to maintain the carbon in the soil and vegetation without being emitted to the atmosphere. However, understanding the scale of GHG emissions is important to both adjust restoration implementation as well as to countries to report on their climate action.

Forests and other land use (FOLU)  sector including peat fires are the main sources of GHG emissions in the country. As reported in the second biennial report, in 2016, emissions from the FOLU sector were estimated at 635,449 Gg CO₂e corresponding to 44% of the national GHG emissions (1,457,774 Gg CO₂e ). In 2016, the main sources of emissions in the FOLU sector were: peat decomposition (28%), forest degradation (23%) and land-use conversion to cropland (22%).

Peatland drainage makes peatlands prone to fire, and causes major health risks through haze. The peatland fires in Indonesia and rest of South-East Asia in 2019 are a good sign that further restoration efforts are needed.

 In Indonesia, peatland restoration are integral part of national policies to reduce the number of fires and to protect habitats, biodiversity and carbon stocks and avoiding GHG emissions.  Supported by Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the Peatland Restoration Agency (BRG) is developing its Peatland Restoration Information and Monitoring System (PRIMS)  to be more efficient in achieving its restoration goals.

Training to calculate carbon balance

In April 2020, adjusting its capacity development activities to the COVID-19 situation, FAO offered  three online sessions to support the activities of climate experts in 10 Indonesian agencies and project partners. The objective of the webinars was to strengthen the technical capacities of experts in quantifying the climate change mitigation potential of peatland restoration activities.

Under the project ‘Development of an Innovative Peatland Monitoring System’ FAO has carried out training sessions since 2019 using the Ex-Ante Carbon Balance Tool (EX-ACT). EX-ACT is an Excel based tool developed by FAO to estimate the mitigation potential of land management practices on the carbon balance. The EX-ACT tool has been tailored and updated to reflect as much as possible the national conditions in Indonesia. The ultimate objective of using the tool is to quantify the climate change mitigation potential of peatland restoration activities carried out and coordinated by the Indonesian Peatland Restoration Agency (BRG). The tool follows the methodology published by the IPCC 2013 Wetlands Supplement to the 2006 IPCC Guidelines for National Greenhouse Gas Inventories (IPCC 2014) and it is based on IPCC default and country-specific data.

As  Adam Gerrand, Forestry Officer from FAO Indonesia pointed out,  “many international organizations use the EX-ANTE carbon balance tool (EX-ACT), and for example World Bank has already made the tool obligatory for assessing projects’ sustainability,“.

Three training sessions will be followed by longer online trainings for the nominated officials. The course participants from Ministry of Environment and Forestry, BRG, National Institute of Aeronautics and Space (LAPAN), Indonesian Geospatial Information Agency (BIG), Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysical Agency (BMKG), Agency for the Assessment and Application of Technology (BPPT), Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), Bogor Agricultural University (IPB) and World Resources Institute Indonesia (WRI) are also giving feedback and support the further refinement of the tool.