Conservation Program 2004-2008

World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) started to work in Indonesia in the early 1960’s as a Program Office of WWF International, under the auspices of the Ministry of Forestry, c.q. the Directorate for Forest Protection and Nature Conservation. The main activity at this early stage was research on mammal species, especially the endangered rhinoceros and tigers on the islands of Java and Sumatra. In 1965, WWF launched a program in Ujung Kulon National Park in West Java province to save the Java rhino. The program then led to efforts of conserving the forest habitat of endangered species.

Indonesian forests and oceans are the home to several charismatic species in danger of extinction such as the rhinoceros, orang utans, tigers, elephants and turtles. With growing international attention to conservation in Indonesia more WWF projects were started. Between 1990 and 1995 WWF-Indonesia has experienced rapid growth. The few projects within the Program Office increased into more than forty, its number of staff multiplied from half a dozen staff members to three hundred, and the organization flourished, reaching beyond its original scope of work. WWF-Indonesia began to work with forest and coastal communities. Many of WWF’s projects aimed to improve the livelihoods of these communities.

In April 1998, WWF-Indonesia Program became a national organization and registered with the Indonesian government with foundation status. WWF-Indonesia became part of the WWF Global Network, which consists of 27 National Organizations, 6 Associate Organizations, and 22 Program Offices around the world.

,br> Under the new organization status, there were significant changes taking place between 1999 and 2001; WWF-Indonesia management structure became decentralized; three bioregion offices were set up: Sundaland, Wallacea, and Sahul to implement the conservation program. The conservation program focus its efforts in areas known as centres of biodiversity identified by WWF as Global 200 ecoregions, 19 of which lie within Indonesia’s political boundaries. WWF-Indonesia developed local partnerships engaging government agencies and NGOs in collaborative efforts to provide solutions for nature conservation.

WWF-Indonesia has been embarking on a major endeavour to shift from project based into a program-based organization. Strategic planning starting this process began in 2001, resulting in major decisions for WWF-Indonesia to:

-Develop six thematic programs: forest, marine, species, climate change, freshwater, toxics.

-Transform its bioregional-based management, into programmatic based management.

-Establish a Program or Conservation Division, lead by a Program/ Conser-vation Director.

At the early phase of its change process from a project to programmatic based organization, WWF-Indonesia has initially planned to work on the six thematic programs: Forest, Oceans and Coasts (marine), Species, Freshwater, Climate Change and Toxics. After two years, in early 2004 WWF-Indonesia concluded to focus further on five programs, with the Toxic programme related issues being integrated into the other five programs. Currently both the climate change and fresh water programmes are in the development stages with the climate change program further advanced.