New inter-faculty program trains Indonesians

Two UT professors recently joined forces to offer training on environmental assessment for spatial planning. This August, twenty Papuan academics spent three weeks of intensive training at the ITC. The group of academics and professors traveled to Indonesia on 22 August to continue the training program for two weeks.

Drs. Joan Looijen and Dr. Karen Buchanan welcomed faculty members from the State University of Papua (UNIPA) to a tailor-made program on Environmental Impact and Risk Assessment (EIRA). Most of the students are already professionals working in natural resource management. Looijen is an ecologist specializing in Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) and Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) and has taught at the ITC since 1985. ‘I’m almost part of the furniture,’ she said. ‘And it’s great that Karen is back.’

Buchanan joined the Twente Centre for Studies in Technology and Sustainable Development (CSTM) at the UT in December last year. She and Looijen also worked together when Buchanan was a lecturer at the ITC from 1999 to 2003. ‘Our main purpose in providing this training is to teach good environmental assessment procedures, including risk management,’ said Buchanan. ‘We provide the students with methods, tools, and techniques available in the Netherlands and other European countries. We then have the students apply this acquired knowledge directly to their own experiences and area of expertise.’

While at the ITC, students took field trips once a week. They visited areas related to SEA for the ‘Space for the River Plan’ and the Netherlands Commission on Environmental Assessment (NCEA) in Utrecht. Locally, they also paid a visit to the Twente Airport area to assess different scenarios for the regional airfield. ‘We arranged these trips so students could meet professionals and ask practical questions,’ said Buchanan, ‘but also so they could experience other parts of the Netherlands. For some, this is their first trip to Europe.’

Saraswati Prabawardani, from the UNIPA Department of Agriculture was impressed with their visit to NCEA. ‘They were so responsible, transparent, and independent when assessing the environment and the concerns of the local community. We could improve at home in this area,’ she said.

‘This program has a nice balance,’ said Vera Sabariah from the Department of Fisheries. ‘We have an opportunity to understand factual cases and software models, visit local sites, and still have time left over to visit museums.’

‘The program has been more than I expected,’ said Yubelince Runtuboi from the Department of Forest Management. ‘I am very much impressed with the approach to environmental assessment in the Netherlands.’

This training program not only unites the Natural Resources Department of the ITC with CSTM in the School of Management and Governance, but also brings in their respective Indonesian partners, including the State University of Indonesia, Gadjah Mada University, Unpad, and now UNIPA.

All 20 participants, as well as Looijen and Buchanan, left on August 22 to continue the training at the UNIPA campus based in Manokwari for another two weeks. ‘We are hopefully providing these academics with a set of tools and a very practical outcome,’ said Buchanan.

Looijen was thrilled to be traveling to Papua as she was born there in 1954 and will be returning for the first time since she was six years old. ‘It’s very exciting,’ she said. ‘I will return to my roots. I’ve been asking my parents about where we were living and tried to plot their directions on a map. Hopefully, I will find where I grew up.’

This isn’t the first time that Looijen and Buchanan have collaborated. Last April they co-designed and taught a training program on SEA and spatial planning to 18 participants from the Indonesian Ministry of Home Affairs. One afternoon was spent bicycling to the Lonneker windmill. ‘With all the preparation, you’d think we were going to the North Pole!’ laughed Buchanan. ‘It was a lovely experience and the students felt that they were really in the Netherlands once they rode their bicycles.’

‘The participants in April were mostly from Java and other western provinces. This is the first time participants from Papua are attending our EIRA course,’ said Looijen.

Papua is the largest province of Indonesia comprising most of the western half of the island shared with Papua New Guinea. Ecologically, Papua is mostly a tropical rainforest with vast biodiversity. Not only does it have the tallest tropical trees, but also the world’s longest lizards (Papua monitor lizard) and the world’s largest butterflies.

Risk assessment of natural resources is essential in this region as ecological threats include logging-induced deforestation, forest conversion for oil palm plantations, the extraction of gold and other minerals, and water pollution from oil and mining operations. Papua’s ancient rain forests have recently come under an even greater threat of deforestation after the Chinese government placed an order of $1 billion or 800,000 cubic meters of the threatened rainforest timbers, used in buildings for the 2008 Summer Olympics.

‘We need to figure out how to translate this knowledge into the reality we face at home,’ said Alexander Yaku, Entomolgist from the Department of Plant Protection. ‘Most of the time our concern is how to feed people. People can look at conservation when their stomachs are full. If you criticize a big company, they will try to buy your silence with a high-paying job. It’s a challenge to apply this knowledge to our situation.’

 ‘Yes,’ agreed Runtuboi. ‘We must change our thinking. We must start with ourselves. Our families. We must change, or we’ll lose everything.’

‘With the help of international attention and pressure, there is hope,’ smiled Yaku. ‘Recently, the Indonesian government passed a stricter environmental law. So things are slowly changing for the better. But much remains to be done.’

The program’s goal is to have participants become capable trainers in the field so they can enhance education in their universities and local government. ‘We were informed that our April training program was hugely successful,’ said Buchanan. ‘Many of those participants are already providing workshops in Indonesia.’

Looijen is Dutch and received her degrees in ecology and ethnology at Groningen University. Specializing in EIA, SEA and the application of spatial decision support tools, Looijen has 25 years experience in international training and consulting. She has designed and taught more than 50 courses throughout Asia and Africa on natural resource management, remote sensing, GIS and spatial multi-criteria evaluation in a regional and spatial planning context.

Since 2009, Looijen has been involved in hazard- and risk-based environmental assessments for natural-disaster risk reduction in Georgia. ‘Working with professionals from all over the world is one of the major advantages of being at the ITC,’ she said. A true ecologist, she rides her bicycle to work every day.

Buchanan, 41, is British and lived, studied and worked in places as diverse as Cincinnati, Oxford, Zurich and Exeter, before first coming to Enschede in 1999. ‘The Netherlands has consistently provided me with opportunities that I wouldn’t have had anywhere else in Europe,’ she said.

As a chartered spatial planner, Buchanan worked for a wide range of international organizations and institutes on environmental planning and management projects. Her research area is the political ecology of development planning where she specializes in socio-ecological conflicts between extractive industries and biodiversity conservation.

As someone who teaches environmental assessment, Buchanan had much to say about the BP oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico. ‘I am shocked at just how much damage has happened in such a short time. It’s absolutely heartbreaking. Clearly risk management was lacking. This tragic event only highlights how proper procedures need to be followed and corners cannot be cut.’

‘It also shows the failings of the regulating bodies, the need to react quickly and effectively, and the government’s responsibility.’ When asked who was ultimately responsible, she responded, ‘Of course, the oil companies and their sub-contractors. But there is also a collective responsibility. We all live in an oil-driven society. We all consume petroleum-based products and use non-renewable energy sources as we travel around the world.’

Collective responsibility seems to be key for both Looijen and Buchanan in the development of their training programs. ‘We hope to bridge the two faculties,’ said Buchanan, ‘and link the two campuses. This is our way of making the most out of the ITC joining the UT.’

Professors Looijen, left, and Buchanan hope to develop a 12-month intensive master’s program for international professionals in Environmental Assessment for Spatial Planning. (Photo: Gijs van Ouwerkerk)

Academics from UNIPA in Indonesia found their training program ‘balanced, rewarding, practical, and thought provoking’. (Photo: Gijs van Ouwerkerk)

What is Environmental Assessment?

The central goal of environmental assessment is to ensure that environmental, social and economic information is incorporated in sound and well-balanced decision making. Environmental assessment is on two levels. For individual projects, it can be used for building a new dam or motorway, and for strategic decisions, such as in the case of urban spatial planning.

The process involves analyzing the likely effects and impact of decisions, organizing public participation, developing and comparing alternatives, reporting on the public’s comments and alternatives, taking the report into account when making a final decision, and informing the public about that decision.

Key aspects concerning this process are the quality of information, the transparency of the process, and stakeholder participation.