Pekanbaru (Antara) – The Peat Restoration Agency (BRG) is currently striving to restore 40 hectares of vegetation areas in the Giam Siak Kecil and Bukit Batu biosphere reserve forests in Riau province.

The head of the Riau peat restoration working group, Sarjono Budi Subechi, said Monday, April 1, in Pekanbaru, the restoration of forest vegetation in the area had been ongoing since 2018 following the land and forest fire in the previous year.

"The re-vegetation is carried out across 40 hectares areas in Giam Siak with Meranti and Jelutung woods, among others," Sarjono said.

He explained the biosphere reserve forest is one of the two conservation areas in Riau province; the other one is Nature Tourism Park in Dumai city.

However, the replanting program in Dumai was carried out concurrently with the revitalization or development of community economy in the region, while in the biosphere reserve, it was merely a revegetation program as it was an uninhabited area.

"We only run the revegetation program in Giam Siak, while in Dumai, we combine two programs, based on the social characters. Revegetation is a long-term project, so we set alternating plants to support the community economy," he added.

The nature tourism park in Mundam, Medang Kampai district,is one of the damaged areas caused by forest fire in 2017. The Agency initiated several strategies to restore the burnt peatland areas, such as building canal blocking by involving locals and revegetation of forest plants as well as pineapples plants.

Source: https://en.tempo.co/read/1191357/govt-restores-vegetation-in-riau-biosphere-reserve