Forest Landscape auditing: a proposed new mechanism for enhancing the performance of local governance

Abstraksi

Mechanisms for auditing the performance of forest governance do not yet exist because of the complexity of multi-sectoral governance arrangement that pertain in forests, which has hindered the development of suitable metrics. In Indonesia, the absence of suitable auditing methods at the local level has resulted in ongoing conflicts amongst governance actors: government, business, NGOs, and local communities. We propose auditing governance at the forest landscape scale as a way of controlling the scope, and therefore complexity, of an audit. We test this idea with an experimental audit of the governance of Kampar Peninsula, a landscape in Pelalawan district, Riau. Conflicts amongst governance actors have occurred following the implementation of the peat restoration policy, Government Regulation No 57/2016. Our audit objectives are to understand the causes of conflict and recommend strategies for reducing them, leading to better performance. We used commonly accepted standard performance audit methods to gather four types of evidence -documentary, physical, testimonial, and analytical- to support our assessment and recommendations. We expect this governance audit will contribute to the body of knowledge on auditing best practice as well as to a resolution of the current issues on the Kampar Peninsular.