The province of East Kalimantan has the largest tropical
forests in indonesia. Throughout the era of the New
Order government under President Soeharto the natural
resources especially tropical forests were .systematically
exploited without any serious effort on the part of the
government and private companies to take care of the
social and environmental aspect of such exploitation. As
a result, severe environmental degradation tool: place
and the local people in the country side lost their
sources of livelihood in the midst of the presence of
multinational corporations and private forest
concessionaires ironically there were enclaves of
poverty. in this era of regional autonomy there is much
doubt that the situation could get better as local
government authorities tend to repeat past mistakes and
they are unable to control the extensive practice of
illegal logging. This writing will propose some potty
suggestions that might be helpful for promoting the
principles of sustainable development and putting an end
to the phenomenon of "the tragedy of the commons".
