By: Elizabeth Linda Yuliani, Desy Leo Ariesta, Moira Moeliono
Figure 1. Left: Sepandan Island, Danau Sentarum National Park. Right: training participants and resource persons. Photos by Rifky/CIFOR.
The wall clock in the Betung Kerihun – Danau Sentarum National Park meeting room on the remote Sepandan Island was pointing at 20:30. Outside, strong winds were blowing and heavy rain was starting to fall. Most participants of the training on Water Quality and Fish Population Monitoring looked tired, but remained enthusiastic, listening and raising issues for discussions about such topics as relationships between waste, aquatic plants, and fish harvest (see Box 1); the use of biofilters; and wetlands’ carrying capacity.
An hour later, the evening session was over; participants and resource persons quickly prepared to get some much-needed rest in the guesthouse. Unfortunately, that was not to be the case for some of the committee members (including us) who had to hurry back to the village of Lanjak to prepare logistics for the following days. Quickly, we got on to our speedboat and headed through the dark night and heavy rain to Lanjak, arriving in the homestay an hour later. We were wet, tired but relieved and happy as the first day went well: the first of many exciting days organizing this training.
Box 1.
“Years ago, dry season meant the peak of fish harvest season, but this has changed. Fish are now scarce, even in the dry season. The fish decline started when waste and kangkung (water spinach) started to dominate the waters. Is there any relation between those phenomena?” asked Zainuri, one of local community representatives from Vega village.
Using basic terms, resource persons explained that the presence of waste reduces water quality. Kangkung, on the one hand, absorbs water pollutants but on the other hand, the high density of this plant indicates too high organic nutrient inflow. The question during training has triggered further discussions on wastes and weeds management.
Figure 2. Night sessions. Left photo: E.L. Yuliani/CIFOR. Right photo: Rifky/CIFOR
The training event had been initially proposed a few years earlier by Betung Kerihun – Danau Sentarum National Park members and the Environmental Service of Kapuas Hulu Regency during a capacity-building needs assessment at the beginning of the COLANDS initiative. The proposal came up again in multi-stakeholder workshops and meetings on Collaborative Management of Danau Sentarum Catchment Areas. The need was clear: most of the participants in this training had backgrounds in forestry, rather than monitoring and managing wetlands and fish. And they wanted to understand both.
To meet their training needs, we invited Prof. Ir. Gadis Sri Haryani, Dr. Iwan Ridwansyah, M.Sc, and Sulung Nomosatryo, M.Si from the Research Center for Limnology, Indonesian Research and Innovation Agency, as the resource persons.
Figure 3. Training sessions. Photos by E.L. Yuliani/CIFOR
Held on Sepandan Island (one of the islands in the Danau Sentarum National Park) 27 February-2 March 2023, the training was attended by 29 participants (five women, 24 men) representing key stakeholder groups of the Danau Sentarum, i.e., 21 national park staff, three staff of the Regency Environmental Service, one staff from the Regency Fishery Service, and four representatives of local communities. The training was organized in two main parts: theory and practice, summarized in Table 1 below.
Table 1
| Course | Theory (class) | Practicum |
| Lake water quality | ✔ | |
| Lake hydromorphology | ✔ | |
| Methods for restoring and improving lake water quality | ✔ | |
| Analysis of causes of fish kills | ✔ | ✔ |
| Methods for fish population monitoring | ✔ | ✔ |
| Limnology sampling methods | ✔ | ✔ |
| Lake water quality measurement | ✔ | ✔ |
| Lake carrying capacity for particular uses | ✔ | |
| Introduction to hydrology modeling (SWAT) and lake water quality (SWAT-WET) | ✔ | |
| Bathymetry mapping | ✔ | ✔ |
| Hydrology modeling simulation (Sentarum catchment case) | ✔ | ✔ |
Although some participants found the terminology challenging and difficult to follow, others were interested and enthusiastic to learn and eager to implement their new knowledge and skills in their daily tasks. The mix of participants’ backgrounds also created opportunities for information exchanges, leading to new research ideas. For example, the water turn-over, or air bangar, phenomenon was initially thought by the resource persons to be caused by a humic acid reaction. But after hearing more information and detailed descriptions from the national park staff and the community representatives, the resource persons began to suspect other explanations of air bangar that will require further studies. This discussion has generated new ideas for further limnological research.
One of the most exciting sessions was bathymetri mapping; that is, the study of floors or beds of bodies of water. On the third day of training, participants travelled by speedboat to see how bathymetri mapping is done. Under a bright sky, the five speedboats moved close to one another so that participants could watch Dr. Iwan’s monitor that showed the lakebed contours and underwater objects. Sudden exclamations of excitement were heard when large underwater objects were detected. Back at Sepandan Island, Dr. Iwan showed how the data should be analyzed and interpreted.
Figure 4: Bathymetri mapping. Photos by A.P. Putra/CIFOR
The intensive four-day training was interspersed with some energizing games. In one, participants were grouped and each participant was asked to write one new word they learned in the training. Each group then generated a paragraph that connected all words.
Figure 5. Energizer games to memorize and arrange key terms into a short paragraph. Photos by E.L. Yuliani and Rifky/CIFOR.
On the fourth and final day, training continued along with communication, learning and information exchanges. After the training concluded, participants asked for guidance from trainers on specific methods, and discussed new ideas for better practices such as continuing to work together through WhatsApp groups and face-to-face meetings.
The discussions not only resulted in new ideas but also follow-up activities, such as a waste cleanup activity; and training on formulation of village regulations concerning waste management and community-based biodiversity protection held on 25-26 August 2023.
Final reflections: the teamwork
This training was held shortly after a separate training session on Biodiversity and Citizen Science for teachers and the Education Service, held in Putussibau, 22-23 February 2023. Organizing two events back-to-back was quite challenging, demanding a strong ability to multitask and to respond in a timely manner to sudden requests and changes. At the same time, we also faced some uncertainties, such as the schedule of flights between the cities of Putussibau and Pontianak, weather, etc.
Fortunately, we had a wonderful and solid team, as we have been consistently applying one key principle: work with the best (strengths) of people. Our local NGO partner Riak Bumi Indonesia Foundation was proactive and played major roles in coordination among different groups, and filling particular needs, such as obtaining the preservative formalin and 96 percent alcohol for the fish practicum. On two nights, we organizers had to cross the lake under heavy rain at 21:30, arriving at about 23:00 at our homestay, and continued working until 01:00 to 02:00, then woke up at 06:00 to start all over again. We were all exhausted but we stayed happy and energized, with the valuable presence of team members who were natural mood boosters and sources of laughter, others who helped everyone remain calm, and those who became problem-solvers in the team.
Kudos to them all.
