When President Prabowo Subianto calls illegal tin mining a “systemic robbery” of Indonesia’s wealth, the statement sounds like a breakthrough — finally, an acknowledgment that the extractive economy is bleeding the country dry. But just a few days later, the same government announced plans to convert 481,000 hectares of Papua’s forest into a food estate.
This is the paradox that defines Indonesia’s climate politics today: a government that denounces greed while expanding projects rooted in it.
The Illusion of Progress
Each week, new policies are announced in the name of sustainability “green investments,” “climate partnerships,” “energy transition.” Yet, when we look closer, the narrative feels eerily familiar: fossil fuels still dominate 79% of the energy mix, forests continue to fall, and local communities are forced to adapt without being heard.
The newly issued Government Regulation №40/2025 on the National Energy Policy has even lowered renewable energy ambitions, locking the country deeper into coal dependence. Experts warn that such a move will not only produce stranded clean energy investments but also make Indonesia’s Paris targets impossible to reach.
If development continues to mean expansion of land, extraction, and inequality then what kind of transition are we really making?
The Cost of “Systemic Robbery”
Prabowo’s statement about illegal mining in Bangka Belitung causing Rp67 trillion in state losses, was meant to expose corruption. But it also exposes something else: how deeply extractive logic is woven into our economy.
It’s not just tin. From nickel to palm oil to so-called “food estates,” the same pattern repeats: large-scale concessions handed to corporations, Indigenous lands taken in the name of national progress, and environmental degradation justified as “development.”
These aren’t isolated crimes; they are symptoms of a system that treats nature as a cash machine and communities as collateral damage.
The Global Mirror
Abroad, the contrast is stark.
Germany set a record €11.8 billion in international climate finance, exceeding its target proof that serious commitment is possible. Brazil, meanwhile, continues negotiating the Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF), a US$125 billion initiative to protect tropical forests through long-term finance mechanisms.
Yet in the same global arena, the United States, under Trump’s renewed denialist rhetoric, has slashed billions in clean energy funds calling climate policy a “hoax.”
This is the world Indonesia walks into ahead of COP30 in Belém: one of contradictions, competing interests, and contested truths.
Faith, Wisdom, and Resistance
From the pulpits of pesantren to the forests of Nusa Tenggara Timur, voices of moral clarity are rising. KH Mahbub Ma’afi of PBNU reminds us that, in Islamic jurisprudence, forests are “God’s entrusted assets” to destroy them is not merely an ecological failure but a spiritual one.
And far from Jakarta, women like Mama Aleta Baun continue to weave resistance into history literally. Sitting atop marble rocks once targeted by mining companies, she and the Mollo women wove cloths of defiance until the bulldozers stopped.
Their message is quiet but radical: climate justice begins with dignity, not policy.
The Price of Delay
Indonesia’s climate financing needs have ballooned to Rp3,461 trillion by 2030. In response, the Climate Catalytic Fund (CCF) has been launched a partnership between KADIN and IOM aimed at bridging adaptation gaps through private and public collaboration.
But while funds and frameworks multiply, the question remains: who benefits first? Those at the frontline of the crisis the Indigenous, the coastal, the rural still wait for inclusion.
They don’t need more pledges. They need protection, participation, and power.
Justice Beyond Rhetoric
As COP30 approaches, Indonesia finds itself at a crossroads between credibility and contradiction. Will the government honor its climate promises or continue to build seawalls while tearing down forests?
The world is not waiting for another speech. It’s waiting for proof that justice climate, social, and ecological is possible in a country that has everything to lose and everything to teach.
Because in the end, justice is not declared at a podium in New York.
It is built quietly, persistently on the land we choose to protect.
