Enviro News Asia, Jakarta — Indonesia’s Ministry of Forestry awarded the 2026 Wana Lestari National Awards to 63 exemplary individuals across 20 categories and recognized 10 winners of the 2026 Forestry Innovation Competition in Jakarta on Thursday.
The awards were presented by Minister of Forestry Raja Juli Antoni and Vice Minister of Forestry Rohmat Marzuki as part of the commemoration of Indonesia’s 81st Independence Anniversary.
The Wana Lestari Awards recognize government personnel and community members who have demonstrated dedication and made tangible contributions to forest conservation and sustainable forest management at the local level.
Minister Raja Juli Antoni said the awards should not become merely an annual ceremonial event. He called for the best practices demonstrated by the award recipients, described as “Forest Heroes,” to be documented, studied, adopted, and replicated across Indonesia.
“The winners are centers of excellence. Their profiles and best practices must be detailed so that we can learn from and replicate them elsewhere,” Raja Juli said.
He said successful practices at the local level should help drive a broader transformation toward sustainable forests nationwide, measured through three key outcomes: improved community welfare, biodiversity conservation, and reduced carbon emissions.
Raja Juli also praised the innovations submitted through the 2026 Forestry Innovation Competition. A five-month selection process evaluated 38 innovation proposals before selecting the five best initiatives in the work-unit and individual/team categories.
The minister instructed that useful digital applications developed through the competition should not operate as standalone systems. Instead, they should be integrated into the Ministry of Forestry’s official applications to strengthen public policy implementation.
Acting Head of the Ministry’s Forestry Extension and Human Resources Development Agency (BP2SDM), Indra Eksploitasia, said this year’s awards were significantly strengthened through the addition of six new categories resulting from collaboration among the ministry’s directorates general.
Of the 63 Wana Lestari recipients, 21 were recognized under the human resource development pillar managed by BP2SDM. The categories included civil servant forestry extension officers, community forestry extension officers, Forest Farmer Groups, and KHDTK managers, as well as two new categories focused on education: forestry instructors and vocational forestry teachers.
Under the law enforcement pillar managed by the Directorate General of Law Enforcement, 12 awards were presented to forestry police officers, forestry civil servant investigators, Manggala Agni personnel, and Fire-Aware Community members.
Environmental restoration efforts were also recognized through the Directorate General of Watershed Management and Land Rehabilitation, which presented 12 awards to groups involved in rehabilitation activities, watershed forums, critical land restoration, and mangrove conservation.
Meanwhile, the Directorate General of Conservation of Natural Resources and Ecosystems and the Directorate General of Social Forestry each presented nine awards. The recipients included nature conservation groups, conservation cadres, forest ecosystem controllers, and community forest managers working in Community Forests, Village Forests, and Customary Forests.
The Ministry of Forestry said the complete list of 2026 Wana Lestari Award recipients and Forestry Innovation Competition winners is available through its official information channels.
The awards are intended to recognize grassroots contributions while encouraging the wider adoption of effective forest management practices, community empowerment initiatives, conservation efforts, and technological innovations across Indonesia. (*)
