I Nyoman Budi Satriya
Over
the past 20 years, the world has faced many problems, particularly in
environment sustainability. As we know, during the globalization era, many
industries which are related with food, textiles, and machinery have been built
to accommodate people’s needs. On the one hand, these phenomenon’s have
positive impacts to human lives, but on the other hand this might create global
warming. Global warming is one of the greatest issues these days. It causes
climate change all over the world and might be responsible to the world’s much
environment disaster that affects people lives. For example, in many parts of
the world climate change affect many natural disasters like droughts, floods,
sea level rise, hunger and poverty, which are very rare if we look back before
the 19th century. According to Mirza (2001, p.233) increasing
incidence of bad weather and natural disasters which are caused by climate
change are generally experienced by the developing countries which are
particularly susceptible to extreme weather changes. In this case, Indonesia is
one of the developing countries in the world which are affected by global
warming and climate change. This essay will discuss about the
effect of climate change that has occurred in Indonesia, then it will examine
about the major cause of climate change and in what way government has already
done to reduce about its impact.
It has been claimed that Indonesia
is famous for the richness of its natural diversity. However, among the
industrialized countries Indonesia continues to occur environmental degradation
and this situation are exacerbated by the increasing greenhouse gas emissions
from forest fire and environmental damage (Measey 2010, p.43). As Perri (2011)
in Parry, Canziani and Palutikof (2007) show marine ecosystem is strongly
influenced by climate change which interferes with the management of fishing
gear and fishing time. It has affected many sectors from agricultural, forestry
and marine environment, particularly in ocean environment which has suffered
the greatest impacts of climate change. This is caused by the destruction of
fish habitat especially coral reef and mangrove, the decline rate of marine
benthic and plankton, the migration of fishing ground and also the increase
rate of fish disease due to ocean acidification. Furthermore, many fishermen
are finding it really difficult in setting regular time to start fishing,
because of the unfixed weather. Moreover, due to the rapid change in marine
conditions, fish also find it difficult to find the right time to start
spawning or begin finding the suitable place in order to nurture their eggs.
These all can both affect environmental sustainability and economic welfare of
fishermen. In addition, the destruction of marine environment can reduce sea’s
ability to absorb carbon dioxide (Co2) that is much contained in the
atmosphere.
The increased rate of human
population is believed to be the main cause for climate change phenomenon and
leads to the increased rate of human necessities, particularly in foods,
clothes and housing. Many fabrics have been made and many timbers have been cut
to become raw material. The destructive of human activities such as illegal
logging, and deforestation may increase the concentration of CO2 in the
atmosphere (NASA 2015). The increased rate of fabric and the decreased rate of
forests make exhaust gas accumulated in the atmosphere. Consequently, this
output process interacts with oxygen and carbon in the air and causing what we
have called now as the greenhouse effect. It means that, light from the sun
passes through directly into the earth and earth cannot have enough capability
to absorb and dissolve it since many trees and coral reefs are destructed. This
natural effect only can be neutralized by the increasing oxygen rate in the
air. Therefore, the existence of trees and coral reefs become very important in
order to minimize excessive levels of CO2 in the air.
Rising sea levels, extreme weather
and the destruction of ecosystems are several impacts which are caused by
climate change in Indonesia. Nevertheless, the government is aware about this
and started thinking about findings the best solution to reduce the impact of
climate change. To tackle this situation, Integrated Coastal Zone Management
(ICZM) which involved many stakeholders include local government is Indonesia's
main priority. According to Farhan and Lim (2013) Integrated Coastal Zone Management
(ICZM) is defined as sustainable and integrated management activities in
coastal areas which involve many coastal communities that connect directly to
the coastal areas. The management system must be environmentally sustainable, for
example, in 2009 in order to maintain the diversity of living marine resources,
Indonesia with five other countries formed the Coral Triangle Initiative (CTI),
which aims to preserve the 75,000 square kilometers of coral reef area (Soesilo 2014). Furthermore,
many programs have been built to reduce the impacts of climate change, such as
beach cleaning program and some campaigns for fisheries communities to
empowering them and increase their awareness of keeping their environment clean
and more sustainable. In 2011 Indonesia forest ministry started the program to
plant more than 1 million trees, particularly in coastal areas. This program is
called “Reboisasi” which means making rehabilitation to destroyed forests and
to get it revitalized again. Also, in the marine area, our government has
launched the “Sehati” program to revitalize damage coral reefs and also
mangroves.
In conclusion, this essay has
discussed about the effect of climate change in Indonesia and marine
environment which is suffered the greatest impact of climate change
biologically and economically. It has shown that increasing rate of human’s
population lead to a massive natural exploitation in order to fulfill their
necessities. Moreover, deforestation occurred in line with increase growth in
fabric and motor vehicle. Indeed, the destruction of coral reefs and mangrove
in coastal environment upturn the risks of Carbon dioxide (CO2) content in the
atmosphere. Nonetheless, Indonesia government is very concerned with this issue
and pay more attention relates withmanagement integrationwhich involving
multiple stakeholders in coastal management. In addition, more active
involvement of the coastal community helped reduce the impact of climate
change.
References
Nasa 2015, A
Blanket around the earth,http://climate.nasa.gov/causes/,accessed 4 February
2015.
Soesilo,I.2014,
Climate change:Indonesia's adaptation and mitigation effort,
http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2014/04/26/climate-change-indonesia-s-adaptation-and-mitigation-efforts.html,
accessed 6 February 2015.
