Jakarta — Indonesia is accelerating efforts to reshape conservation financing through an ambitious national park funding scheme aimed at reducing reliance on public budgets, while simultaneously building safeguards to ensure emerging biodiversity credit markets protect Indigenous communities and biodiversity.
At the London Climate Action Week 2026, on Thursday, June 26, Forestry Minister Raja Juli Antoni unveiled Indonesia’s “innovative financing” strategy for national parks and biodiversity conservation, positioning it as a shift from conventional conservation funding toward investment-driven, long-term nature finance.
Speaking at the Peusangan Elephant Conservation Initiative (PECI) Roundtable, Raja Juli said Indonesia is building a new conservation model where protected areas become financially self-sustaining through blended financing and private-sector participation.
“Indonesia is not merely designing financing strategies. We are building a new conservation governance paradigm, where national parks achieve financial independence, communities become key partners, the private sector plays a meaningful role, and the state provides a strong regulatory framework,” he said.
As part of President Prabowo Subianto’s directive, the government has established a task force on innovative financing for national park management and iconic species conservation. The task force is chaired by presidential climate and energy envoy Hashim S. Djojohadikusumo, with support from presidential envoy for trade and multilateral cooperation Mari Elka Pangestu.
The task force aims to make at least 13 national parks and two iconic species conservation landscapes financially independent by 2030.
Financial instruments under development include carbon credits, biodiversity credits, species conservation bonds, ecotourism, bioprospecting, non-timber forest products, and public-private partnerships.
A flagship pilot under the scheme is the Peusangan Elephant Conservation Initiative in Aceh, designed to demonstrate how wildlife protection, habitat connectivity, and community economic development can be integrated within a single conservation landscape. The initiative focuses on protecting the critically endangered Sumatran elephant.
The financing push comes as Indonesia also moves to shape rules for biodiversity credit markets.
Earlier in the week, Environment Minister Moh Jumhur Hidayat said Indonesia’s biodiversity credit system must ensure local communities and Indigenous peoples remain the primary beneficiaries of conservation-related investments.
Speaking in London on Monday, June 22, Jumhur warned that global nature markets risk sidelining the communities that directly protect forests and biodiversity.
“The foundation of successful biodiversity credits is fair and equitable benefit-sharing for local communities and Indigenous peoples doing the real work of conservation,” he said.
The Environment Ministry said Indonesia is strengthening legal safeguards to prevent exploitation, including guaranteeing Indigenous communities the right to grant or withhold consent over projects in customary lands.
The government is also finalising regulations on access and benefit-sharing to ensure profits derived from genetic resources and traditional knowledge are shared fairly with local communities.
Indonesia’s biodiversity credit framework seeks to go beyond traditional conservation metrics such as forest cover by assigning economic value to species and ecosystem health. Under the system, protecting endangered wildlife such as the Sumatran tiger and the orangutan could generate measurable financial value.
To prevent greenwashing and double-counting, the Environment Ministry is strengthening monitoring, reporting and verification standards while aligning biodiversity credit policies with Indonesia’s long-term biodiversity strategy, IBSAP 2025–2045.
Together, the two initiatives signal Indonesia’s broader effort to position itself as a leader in nature-based finance—seeking to attract global capital for conservation while ensuring environmental integrity and social justice remain central to the transition. (nsh)
Banner photo: Image generated by OpenAI’s DALL·E via ChatGPT (2024)
