Plant 1.000.000 Trees in Indonesia Damaged Forest

True restoration does not begin with outside intervention—it begins with the people who live closest to the forest. In Ngrawoh Village, Kradenan Sub-district, Blora Regency, Central Java, rural communities are stepping forward as the primary actors in protecting and restoring their surrounding forest landscapes.

Through collaboration between Yayasan INFEST Universitas Gadjah Mada, village leaders and community members have strengthened their capacity to design participatory, evidence-based policies for forest conservation and community empowerment. Rather than relying solely on top-down programs, the process emphasizes mapping village authority, assessing welfare conditions, and identifying local assets that can support sustainable forest governance. This ensures that restoration strategies are grounded in local realities and legally supported at the village level.

At the practical level, restoration is implemented through agroforestry and agrosilvopastoral systems that integrate coffee cultivation, timber and fruit trees, and livestock management within the same land-use system. By diversifying crops and restoring tree cover, farmers improve soil health, enhance water retention, reduce climate risks, and generate more stable long-term incomes.

The shift is not merely ecological—it is social and economic. Farmers are moving from short-term extraction to regenerative land management. Communities are redefining forests not as distant state-controlled spaces, but as shared landscapes where conservation and livelihoods can coexist.

This is restoration led by rural communities—where local knowledge, collective planning, and sustainable production systems become the foundation for climate resilience and long-term prosperity.

Climate action becomes meaningful when it is rooted in the lives of the people who depend directly on the land. In Ngrawoh Village, Kradenan Sub-district, Blora Regency, Central Java, forests are not abstract environmental assets—they are sources of water, income, and identity for rural families. Yet increasing ecological pressure and limited economic alternatives have made forest governance more complex and urgent.

In response, Yayasan INFEST, in collaboration with the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, Universitas Gadjah Mada, conducted a Village Appreciative Planning Training on 17 October 2025 to strengthen participatory forest governance at the village level. The training brought together 30 participants from the village government and local community members, creating a shared space to design evidence-based policies that integrate community empowerment, economic development, and forest conservation.

Rather than imposing external solutions, the process emphasized strengthening village capacity. Participants were trained to develop three core planning instruments: mapping village authority related to forest governance, assessing community welfare conditions, and identifying local assets and potentials for sustainable forest-area management. These tools will guide future village policies, supported by field surveys and data validation, ensuring that conservation strategies are grounded in real community needs and legally recognized governance structures.

Beyond planning, the collaboration introduced an agroforestry–agrosilvopastoral approach in Kradenan District. This integrated system combines agriculture, tree planting, and livestock management within the same landscape. In Ngrawoh Village, the initiative focuses on coffee-based agroforestry, where coffee is cultivated alongside timber trees, fruit species, and conservation-oriented plants. This diversified planting system improves soil health, strengthens climate resilience, protects watersheds, and provides long-term income opportunities for farmers.

The response from the community has been encouraging. Farmers are increasingly adopting mixed-cropping systems and recognizing that agroforestry offers more than short-term gains. Through continuous facilitation and hands-on practice, communities are redefining their relationship with forest landscapes—not as extractive spaces, but as productive ecosystems that can sustain both livelihoods and biodiversity.

Looking ahead, the Blora experience demonstrates that climate action does not begin with large-scale declarations; it begins in villages. By integrating ecological restoration with economic empowerment, Ngrawoh Village is becoming a local model for sustainable forest governance in Java—where communities are not passive recipients of aid, but active agents of restoration.

This is climate action rooted in community.