From the Winter 2025 issue of Living Bird magazine. Subscribe now.
The Indonesian Minister of Environment and Forestry has declared a new national park on the western side of the island of New Guinea, protecting intact rainforest that hosts some of the highest biodiversity on Earth.
Minister Siti Nurbaya made an announcement about the establishment of Mamberamo National Park on October 15. The new park covers 4 million acres of lowland and mountain rainforests, freshwater swamp forests, and mangroves, and is home to several wildlife species found nowhere else—including the endangered golden-mantled tree-kangaroo and 12 birds-of-paradise species, such as the Bronze Parotia.
The new national park area is also home to 35 Indigenous tribes. According to Minister Nurbaya, the government plans to incorporate the perspectives and knowledge of local tribes in the park’s management.
“The existence of Mamberamo National Park is expected to help the community in improving their standard of living, both economically and also the capacity of human resources around the national park, for example, capacity in the fields of forestry, conservation, and tourism,” said Nurbaya in a story published by the Antara Indonesian news agency.
Deforestation rates in Indonesia have declined over the past decade, partly due to forest protection policies. In June the Indonesian government announced a partnership with the Bezos Earth Fund for financial support to protect as much as 37 million acres of rainforest, including the establishment of new national parks in high-biodiversity areas.
“Indonesia has done something really remarkable,” said Zac Goldsmith, a member of the House of Lords in the British Parliament, and senior fellow at the Bezos Earth Fund. A former Minister of State in the United Kingdom, Goldsmith advises the fund on conservation strategy in the Pacific region. “If other great forest nations had behaved in the manner that Indonesia has, then the whole discussion we’re having here across climate would be very different.”
