Forest cover changes in indonesia’s terrestrial national parks between 2012 and 2017

Dwiyahreni AA, Fuad HAH, Sunaryo, Soesilo TEB, Margules C, Supriatna J. 2021. Forest cover changes in Indonesia’s terrestrial national parks between 2012 and 2017. Biodiversitas 22: 1235-1242. Tropical rainforests are among the most important ecosystems on earth. After Brazil, Indonesia has the second-largest tropical forest area in the world. Since the 1970s, Indonesia's forests have decreased from covering 87% to 50% of its land area. With the ever-increasing pressures from economic and human development, it appears likely that much of the biodiversity and ecosystem services provided by forests in Indonesia will only remain in protected areas. National parks currently cover around 60% or 16 Mha of the total area of protected areas in Indonesia. Between 2012 and 2017, 43 terrestrial national parks in Indonesia lost 1.62% of their total forest cover. However, primary forest cover increased by 0.07%. National parks in the Jawa Bali bioregion, through their better management inputs and community collaborations, ecosystem services to the surrounding areas, as well as natural mountainous conditions, have contributed to the increase of primary forest covers and keeping total forest loss relatively low in Indonesia’s national parks.