Community Building Patkalaman, Indonesia

In October, the ISEC Indonesia Team, organized by Winny Puteri and Azhary Wailissa, launched an incredibly important indigenous community building project in Patkalaman, Maluku. The goal is to help the community fight for their land rights.

The Indonesian government has been violating the rights of Indigenous peoples who have lost their traditional forests and livelihoods to oil palm plantations. Loss of forest occurs on a massive scale and not only harms local Indigenous peoples but is also a contributor to global climate change. The tribe is only paid 5 dollars/month for every hectare of their land.

ISEC Indonesia’s project seeks to help aid the community in fighting the big palm oil corporations through efforts through the law, environmental organizing, and mobilizing young people from across the country.

One major barrier to the tribe’s ability to fight these corporations has been lack of literacy. Because of this, they are also launching reading programs to provide educational opportunities for young people that have been denied access. In addition to literacy programs, they accomplished a huge win by securing three scholarships for them to the Central Maluku Said Perintah University.

Stay tuned— they are scaling up this project in 2021!