Supporting Thriving Futures in the

Ancient Forests of Indonesian Borneo

Planet Indonesia team member Rodi works on reforestation in West Kalimantan, Indonesia | Justin Grubb/Planet Indonesia

In 2024, Legado began a partnership to integrate our Thriving Futures methodology into Planet Indonesia’s work supporting Indigenous Peoples in the Indonesian province of West Kalimantan, located on the island of Borneo.

The tropical ecosystems of Indonesian Borneo are among the oldest and most biodiverse on Earth. Here, rare species make their home, including clouded leopards, the helmeted hornbill, and one of the largest remaining orangutan populations. Many struggle to survive in the face of illegal logging and the expansion of monocultures, which threaten the remaining biodiversity.

Community members support land restoration in West Kalimantan, Indonesia | Planet Indonesia

In Borneo’s Melawi district, Indigenous Peoples hold potential land rights to 70% of more than 2 million hectares of biodiverse landscape. But environmental stress from climate change and high deforestation rates are moving these forest ecosystems towards irreversible tipping points that could collapse biodiversity and disrupt local livelihoods. Socio-economic inequalities and the exclusion of Indigenous Peoples from local governance exacerbate these issues.

360° Community-Led Change

Legado’s partnership with Planet Indonesia starts by working with Indigenous Dayak communities in Melawi District, nested in the two million-hectare Arabella Schwanner landscape, home to Borneo’s largest remaining orangutan population.

Planet Indonesia and Legado will work together, in the first stages of support, alongside four villages in Melawi to secure land rights, reduce poverty, and lead across their holistic priorities towards Thriving Futures.

Our partnership builds on Planet Indonesia’s deep experience and commitment to community-led governance and resource management. Working together, we will create an updated community engagement and planning tool that embeds 360° Community-Led Change into Planet Indonesia’s Core Model approach. The tool will be used to help local communities articulate their legacies and the priorities they want to pursue for their own Thriving Futures.

The resulting Legacy Plans will become the backbone for supporting local governance, grant proposals, and partnerships that support Indigenous communities to take actions that benefit both themselves and their landscapes.

Creating Thriving Futures

Through this partnership, Indigenous Peoples across the region will have the support they need to lead on their community-determined priorities for the sake of their Thriving Future.

Aerial view of a rural landscape in West Kalimantan | Planet Indonesia

Thriving Future Goals and Priorities

These community priorities will be listed as developed in time

Increase Access to Health Care While Respecting Samburu Medicine

Construct maternity shelter integrating Samburu traditional birth practices

Expand solar system to increase electricity in the maternity ward of the Ngilai Clinic

Centering Women Leaders

At Legado, we know that when we Invest in women and help them evolve into leaders, they can help entire communities overcome poverty, and lead the way to improve children’s nutrition, health, and school attendance.*

Creating a community crest in Ngilai, Northern Kenya | Roshni Lodhia/Legado

Legado: Supporting Communities in Conservation Efforts

In June 2024, the Bridgespan Group featured Legado’s work in Ngilai to highlight the power and potential of community-led change in Northern Kenya.

In the article, Richard Newman Lenaseyan, a resident of Ntepees village in Ngilai, explains, “Earlier, projects came dictating what the community needs, but now it’s changing. We feel in charge of identifying our needs and developing a plan.”

Read more about how community-led change is supporting Thriving Futures in Ngilai here.

5 minute read

Ngilai community members mark the official opening of the new maternity shelter, which was envisioned, built, and completed as a Thriving Future priority | N. Leringato/Legado

Respecting Maternal Health

Community members agreed to kick off their Legacy Plan by building a maternity shelter, the first priority agreed upon as part of the vision to create their Thriving Future. The shelter enables traditional Samburu birth methods while increasing access to supplemental or emergency care.

On May 5, 2023, the maternity shelter opened with a joyful celebration with the community champions who led the work. “Despite all the challenges we faced as we constructed this shelter, with drought being the hardest, we stuck together," Purity Lekipila said.

Visit our blog to read an inspiring story of how the vision of the Ngiliai community members for a maternity shelter came to life

Our Partner in West Kalimantan

Planet Indonesia supports equitable social-ecological trajectories for rural communities. Through its Planet Indonesia’s Core Model approach, Planet Indonesia supports local solutions, needs, and values, enhancing the potential of Indigenous and rural communities to restore and maintain the balance between humans and nature. Their approach is collaborative and led by the community, creating the conditions for the community to head sound, natural resource management. Planet Indonesia's work spans 1 million hectares of biodiverse landscapes and reaches 43,000 indigenous and local families.

The Ngilai Community Conservancy (Ngilai Conservation Project) is a Northern Kenyan organization run by a board of 15 democratically elected members by the community every three years through community assembly as guided by Community Land Act of 2016. The conservancy works across wildlife conservation, rangelands management and community development.

Northern Rangelands Trust (NRT) is a membership organization owned and led by the 43 community conservancies it serves in northern and coastal Kenya. NRT was established in 2004 as a shared resource to help build and develop community conservancies, which are best positioned to enhance people’s lives, build peace, and conserve the natural environment. NRT is tasked by community leaders to support indigenous communities in their own objectives to cooperatively develop locally-led governance structures that complement traditional, indigenous systems, run peace and security programmes, take the lead in natural environment management, and manage sustainable businesses linked to conservation.

Join the Movement

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Donate Today

$250Starts one woman on her legacy journey so she can lead change in her community

$500Invests in a family so they can achieve their legacy goals to better education, health, and environmental outcomes for their community

$1,000Supports a community-wide Legacy Plan to incorporate local wisdom and create enduring change

$5,000Launches an initiative to help fulfill a wide range of community priorities, whether it's building a maternity shelter, restoring a rainforest, building a primary school, and so much more