Bearing Witness: Empowering Indonesian Communities to Fight Illegal Logging

Sustainable livelihoods begin with the ability to exercise control over the natural resources on which one depends. For many forest-dependent people, illegal logging short-circuits this control, robbing them of traditional forest uses and income. But some communities in Indonesia have found a way to fight back to preserve their forest livelihoods. With training in the use of video cameras and film-editing techniques, they have begun to document illegal logging incidents, using the footage to gain media coverage and to lobby for action against corrupt forest practices. < p>The video training, provided by a pair of environmental NGOs (nongovernmental organizations), has created a network of empowered citizens based in illegal logging hotspots in 15 regions across the archipelago