Ruminant Livestock as a Solution for Logging Need (Tebang Butuh) in Community Forests

On average, community forest farmers only have narrow land for their forestry timber plantations, this makes it difficult for those who rely on forestry wood for their daily lives. Forest wood plants have a long cycle even for certain plant species up to decades. When there is an urgent need, for example a child wants to go to school, his child's marriage, and so on, the wood plant is cut down even though it is not yet time, which is commonly known as logging need (tebang butuh). Apart from that, the quality of the logs produced is also low, including the selling price as well as the quantity/productivity. The forestry industry with its installed capacity requires a large supply of logs of standard quality. The practice of logging needs (tebang butuh) to be avoided or minimized as much as possible so that optimal benefits will be felt by all parties, both community forest farmers and the forest industries.

To overcome the problems of daily life or urgent needs, ruminant husbandry can be the solution. The land around the main tree can be used as a place for grazing and legumes as a hedge as a source of forage. When the main tree such as albasia is still young, a number of plants such as vegetables and herbs (empon-empon) can still be planted and give good results. But when the main tree is big enough, the plant cannot tolerate shade, so its cultivation not effective even be a loss. Legumes such as calliandra, gliricidia and indigofera can be planted as a source of feed for ruminants (sheep, goats, cows or buffalo).

The ruminant's breeding cycle is faster than that of the forest trees. Types of livestock business that can be done such as breeding, meat production (fattening), milk production (milking) and even trading. Although export opportunities are open, especially sheep and goats, the domestic market is also large. For example, Yogyakarta needs up to 4000 sheep per month, especially for the cluster of satay stalls on Jalan Imogiri Timur, Yogyakarta Special Province. Not to mention the markets in Greater Jakarta and aqiqah. As for beef, Indonesia is also still lacking, which is currently supplied with buffalo meat from India, which accounts for nearly 60% of national needs. Farms like this can be a surefire solution to the problem of logging need (tebang butuh) that hinders the development of community forests at this time. The area of community forest also cannot be underestimated, even in some areas the area of community forest is larger than state forest. Nationally, Indonesian people's forests are estimated at 35 million hectares, while state forests reach 128 million hectares.