Pandemic impacts on protected rainforests and rural communities with variable health and livelihood support in West Kalimantan, Indonesia: a mixed-methods approach combining household surveys and remote sensing.

Publication date: Jun 22, 2027

Community support programmes can simultaneously improve human and ecosystem health. However, whether and how supported communities maintain these sustainable trajectories during major disruptions remains unclear. We used a mixed-methods approach to document how the COVID-19 pandemic impacted rural communities and protected rainforests in West Kalimantan. We surveyed 1016 households across six villages with non-governmental organisation (NGO)-affiliated health-livelihood support and four nearby unaffiliated villages to understand their pandemic experiences and logging activity. We also independently estimated weekly forest loss in protected rainforests in 28 NGO-affiliated and 698 unaffiliated villages using satellite imagery. The pandemic created an economic shock, whereby 50% of households lost income, struggled with increased costs of basic needs, or both. We expected this shock to increase the amount of logging; however, the average forest loss across West Kalimantan decreased by 39% after the pandemic declaration. This decrease was due to the combined effects of the global timber market crash in early 2020, pandemic travel restrictions, and heavy precipitation in 2020 and 2021. Before the pandemic, the average forest loss was 52% lower in NGO-affiliated villages than in unaffiliated villages, with this difference increasing to 68% during the pandemic. Correspondingly, NGO-affiliated households were more likely to report having alternative sustainable livelihoods, several sources of external support (eg, loans), and access to affordable health care and less likely to report increased spending on basic needs during the pandemic. Health and livelihood support can buffer communities during major disturbances, sustaining progress towards improved human wellbeing and forest conservation. David and Lucile Packard Foundation and the National Geographic Society.

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