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Location: Southeastern Asia, archipelago between the Indian
Ocean and the Pacific Ocean
Geographic coordinates: 5 00 S, 120 00 E
Map references: Southeast Asia
Area:
total: 1,919,440 sq km
land: 1,826,440 sq km
water: 93,000 sq km
Area - comparative: slightly less than three times the size
of Texas
Land boundaries:
total: 2,602 km
border countries: Malaysia 1,782 km, Papua New Guinea 820
km
Coastline: 54,716 km
Maritime claims: measured from claimed archipelagic baselines
exclusive economic zone: 200 nm
territorial sea: 12 nm
Climate: tropical; hot, humid; more moderate in highlands
Terrain: mostly coastal lowlands; larger islands have interior
mountains
Elevation extremes:
lowest point: Indian Ocean 0 m
highest point: Puncak Jaya 5,030 m
Natural resources: petroleum, tin, natural gas, nickel,
timber, bauxite, copper, fertile soils, coal, gold, silver
Land use:
arable land: 10%
permanent crops: 7%
permanent pastures: 7%
forests and woodland: 62%
other: 14% (1993 est.)
Irrigated land: 45,970 sq km (1993 est.)
Natural hazards: occasional floods, severe droughts, tsunamis,
earthquakes, volcanoes
Environment - current issues: deforestation; water pollution
from industrial wastes, sewage; air pollution in urban areas; smoke
and haze from forest fires
Environment - international agreements:
party to: Biodiversity, Climate Change, Desertification,
Endangered Species, Hazardous Wastes, Law of the Sea, Nuclear Test
Ban, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution, Tropical Timber 83,
Tropical Timber 94, Wetlands
signed, but not ratified: Climate Change-Kyoto Protocol,
Marine Life Conservation
Geography - note: archipelago of 17,000 islands (6,000 inhabited);
straddles Equator; strategic location astride or along major sea
lanes from Indian Ocean to Pacific Ocean
Geography
Indonesia, the largest archipelago and the fifth most populous nation
in the world, has a total of 17,508 islands, of which about 6,000
are inhabited. The islands extend 3,198 miles (5,150km) and are
nestled between two continents, Asia and Australia, and two oceans,
the Indian and the Pacific.
The main islands are Java, Sumatra, Kalimantan, Sulawesi, Bali,
Nusa Tenggara, Maluku and Irian Jaya. Stretching like a backbone
down the western coast of Sumatra is a line of active and extinct
volcanoes. Much of Indonesia is rain forest, woodland and mangrove
swamps. Only a fraction of the land is suitable for farming.
Climate
Situated over the equator, Indonesia tends to have a fairly uniform
climate - hot. It is equatorial, but cooler in the highlands. Temperatures
generally range from 68 to 89 degrees. Humidity ranges from 60 to
90 percent. Indonesia's "wet season" lasts from November through
April and its "dry season" from May through October, with slight
variations in its regional sub-climatic zones.
Background:
Indonesia declared its independence in 1945 from the Netherlands,
a claim disputed, then recognized by the Dutch in 1949. In 1975
Indonesian troops occupied Portuguese East Timor.
Current issues include implementing IMF-mandated reforms (particularly
restructuring and recapitalizing the insolvent banking sector),
effecting a transition to a popularly elected government, addressing
longstanding grievances over the role of the ethnic Chinese business
class and charges of cronyism and corruption, alleged human rights
violations by the military, the role of the military and religion
in politics, and growing pressures for some form of independence
or autonomy by Aceh, Irian Jaya, and East Timor.
The world's largest archipelago, Indonesia achieved independence
from the Netherlands in 1949.
Current issues include: implementing IMF-mandated reforms of the
banking sector, effecting a transition to a popularly elected government
after years of rule by dictators, addressing charges of cronyism
and corruption among the Chinese-dominated business class, dealing
with alleged human rights violations by the military, and resolving
growing pressures for some form of autonomy or independence in certain
regions such as Aceh and Irian Jaya.
On 30 August 1999 a provincial referendum for independence was overwhelmingly
approved by the people of Timor Timur. Concurrence followed by Indonesia's
national legislature, and the name East Timor was provisionally
adopted.
The independent status of East Timor has yet to be formally established.
Indonesia
GEOGRAPHY
Size: Total land area 1,919,317 square kilometers,
which includes some 93,000 square kilometers of inland seas. Total
area claimed, including an exclusive economic zone, 7.9 million
square kilometers.
Topography: Archipelagic nation with 13,667 islands,
five main islands (Sumatra, Java, Kalimantan, Sulawesi, and Irian
Jaya), two major archipelagos (Nusa Tenggara and Maluku Islands),
and sixty smaller archipelagos. Islands mountainous, with some peaks
reaching 3,800 meters above sea level in western islands and as
high as 5,000 meters in Irian Jaya. Highest point Puncak Jaya (5,039
meters), in Irian Jaya. Region tectonically unstable with some 400
volcanoes, of which 100 are active.
Climate: Tropical, hot, humid; more moderate climate
in highlands. Little variation in temperature because of almost
uniformly warm waters that are part of the archipelago. In much
of western Indonesia dry season June to September, rainy season
December to March.
Data as of November 1992
Indonesia
THE GEOGRAPHIC CONTEXT
Indonesia's variations in culture have been shaped--although not
specifically determined--by centuries of complex interactions with
the physical environment. Although Indonesians are now less vulnerable
to the vicissitudes of nature as a result of improved technology
and social programs, to some extent their social diversity has emerged
from traditionally different patterns of adjustment to their physical
circumstances.
Data as of November 1992
Indonesia
Geographic Regions
Indonesia is a huge archipelagic country extending 5,120 kilometers
from east to west and 1,760 kilometers from north to south. It encompasses
13,667 islands (some sources say as many as 18,000), only 6,000
of which are inhabited. There are five main islands (Sumatra, Java,
Kalimantan, Sulawesi, and Irian Jaya), two major archipelagos (Nusa
Tenggara and the Maluku Islands), and sixty smaller archipelagos.
Two of the islands are shared with other nations; Kalimantan (known
in the colonial period as Borneo, the world's third largest island)
is shared with Malaysia and Brunei, and Irian Jaya shares the island
of New Guinea with Papua New Guinea. Indonesia's total land area
is 1,919,317 square kilometers. Included in Indonesia's total territory
is another 93,000 square kilometers of inlands seas (straits, bays,
and other bodies of water). The additional surrounding sea areas
bring Indonesia's generally recognized territory (land and sea)
to about 5 million square kilometers. The government, however, also
claims an exclusive economic zone, which brings the total to about
7.9 million square kilometers (see National
Territory: Rights and Responsibilities , this ch.).
Geographers have conventionally grouped Sumatra, Java (and Madura),
Kalimantan (formerly Borneo), and Sulawesi (formerly Celebes) in
the Greater Sunda Islands. These islands, except for Sulawesi, lie
on the Sunda Shelf--an extension of the Malay Peninsula and the
Southeast Asian mainland . Far to the east is Irian Jaya (formerly
Irian Barat or West New Guinea), which takes up the western half
of the world's second largest island--New Guinea--on the Sahul Shelf.
Sea depths in the Sunda and Sahul shelves average 200 meters or
less. Between these two shelves lie Sulawesi, Nusa Tenggara (also
known as the Lesser Sunda Islands), and the Maluku Islands (or the
Moluccas), which form a second island group where the surrounding
seas in some places reach 4,500 meters in depth. The term Outer
Islands is used inconsistently by various writers but it is
usually taken to mean those islands other than Java and Madura.
Tectonically, this region--especially Java--is highly unstable,
and although the volcanic ash has resulted in fertile soils, it
makes agricultural conditions unpredictable in some areas. The country
has numerous mountains and some 400 volcanoes, of which approximately
100 are active. Between 1972 and 1991 alone, twentynine volcanic
eruptions were recorded, mostly on Java. The most violent volcanic
eruptions in modern times occurred in Indonesia. In 1815 a volcano
at Gunung Tambora on the north coast of Sumbawa, Nusa Tenggara Barat
Province, claimed 92,000 lives and created "the year without a summer"
in various parts of the world. In 1883 Krakatau in the Sunda Strait,
between Java and Sumatra, erupted and some 36,000 West Javans died
from the resulting tidal wave. The sound of the explosion was reported
as far away as Turkey and Japan. For almost a century following
that eruption, Krakatau was quiet, until the late 1970s, when it
erupted twice.
Mountains ranging between 3,000 and 3,800 meters above sea level
can be found on the islands of Sumatra, Java, Bali, Lombok, Sulawesi,
and Seram. The country's tallest mountains, which reach between
4,700 and 5,000 meters, are located in the Jayawijaya Mountains
and the Sudirman Mountains in Irian Jaya. The highest peak, Puncak
Jaya, which reaches 5,039 meters, is located in the Sudirman Mountains.
Nusa Tenggara consists of two strings of islands stretching eastward
from Bali toward Irian Jaya. The inner arc of Nusa Tenggara is a
continuation of the chain of mountains and volcanoes extending from
Sumatra through Java, Bali, and Flores, and trailing off in the
Banda Islands. The outer arc of Nusa Tenggara is a geological extension
of the chain of islands west of Sumatra that includes Nias, Mentawai,
and Enggano. This chain resurfaces in Nusa Tenggara in the ruggedly
mountainous islands of Sumba and Timor.
The Maluku Islands (or Moluccas) are geologically among the most
complex of the Indonesian islands. They are located in the northeast
sector of the archipelago, bounded by the Philippines to the north,
Irian Jaya to the east, and Nusa Tenggara to the south. The largest
of these islands include Halmahera, Seram, and Buru, all of which
rise steeply out of very deep seas. This abrupt relief pattern from
sea to high mountains means that there are very few level coastal
plains.
Geographers believe that the island of New Guinea, of which Irian
Jaya is a part, may once have been part of the Australian continent.
The breakup and tectonic action created both towering, snowcapped
mountain peaks lining its central east-west spine and hot, humid
alluvial plains along the coast of New Guinea. Irian Jaya's mountains
range some 650 kilometers east to west, dividing the province between
north and south.
Data as of November 1992
Indonesia
Climate
The main variable of Indonesia's climate is not temperature or
air pressure, but rainfall. The almost uniformly warm waters that
make up 81 percent of Indonesia's area ensure that temperatures
on land remain fairly constant . Split by the equator, the archipelago
is almost entirely tropical in climate, with the coastal plains
averaging 28°C, the inland and mountain areas averaging 26°C,
and the higher mountain regions, 23°C. The area's relative humidity
ranges between 70 and 90 percent. Winds are moderate and generally
predictable, with monsoons usually blowing in from the south and
east in June through September and from the northwest in December
through March. Typhoons and largescale storms pose little hazard
to mariners in Indonesia waters; the major danger comes from swift
currents in channels, such as the Lombok and Sape straits.
The extreme variations in rainfall are linked with the monsoons.
Generally speaking, there is a dry season (June to September), influenced
by the Australian continental air masses, and a rainy season (December
to March) that is the result of mainland Asia and Pacific Ocean
air masses. Local wind patterns, however, can greatly modify these
general wind patterns, especially in the islands of central Maluku--Seram,
Ambon, and Buru. This oscillating seasonal pattern of wind and rain
is related to Indonesia's geographical location as an archipelago
between two large continents. In July and August, high pressure
over the Australian desert moves winds from that continent toward
the northwest. As the winds reach the equator, the earth's rotation
causes them to veer off their original course in a northeasterly
direction toward the Southeast Asian mainland. During January and
February, a corresponding high pressure system over the Asian mainland
causes the pattern to reverse. The resultant monsoon is augmented
by humid breezes from the Indian Ocean, producing significant amounts
of rain throughout many parts of the archipelago.
Prevailing wind patterns interact with local topographic conditions
to produce significant variations in rainfall throughout the archipelago.
In general, western and northern parts of Indonesia experience the
most precipitation, since the north- and westward-moving monsoon
clouds are heavy with moisture by the time they reach these more
distant regions. Western Sumatra, Java, Bali, the interiors of Kalimantan,
Sulawesi, and Irian Jaya are the most predictably damp regions of
Indonesia, with rainfall measuring more than 2,000 millimeters per
year. In part, this moisture originates on strategically located
high mountain peaks that trap damp air. The city of Bogor, near
Jakarta, lays claim to having to world's highest number of rainstorms
per year--322. On the other hand, the islands closest to Australia--including
Nusa Tenggara and the eastern tip of Java--tend to be dry, with
some areas experiencing less than 1,000 millimeters per year. To
complicate the situation, some of the islands of the southern Malukus
experience highly unpredictable rainfall patterns, depending on
local wind currents.
Although air temperature changes little from season to season or
from one region to the next, cooler temperatures prevail at higher
elevations. In general, temperatures drop approximately 1° per
90 meters increase in elevation from sea level with some high altitude
interior mountain regions experiencing night frosts. The highest
mountain ranges in Irian Jaya are permanently capped with snow.
Located on the equator, the archipelago experiences relatively
little change in the length of daylight hours from one season to
the next; the difference between the longest day and the shortest
day of the year is only forty-eight minutes. The archipelago stretches
across three time zones: Western Indonesian Time--seven hours in
advance of Greenwich Mean Time (GMT)--includes Sumatra, Java, and
eastern Kalimantan; Central Indonesian Time--eight hours head of
GMT--includes western Kalimantan, Nusa Tenggara, and Sulawesi; and
Eastern Indonesian Time--nine hours ahead of GMT-- includes the
Malukus and Irian Jaya. The boundary between the western and central
time zones--established in 1988--is a line running north between
Java and Bali through the center of Kalimantan. The border between
central and eastern time zones runs north from the eastern tip of
Timor to the eastern tip of Sulawesi.
Data as of November 1992
Indonesia
Environmental Concerns
For centuries, the geographical resources of the Indonesian archipelago
have been exploited in ways that fall into consistent social and
historical patterns. One cultural pattern consists of the formerly
Indianized, rice-growing peasants in the valleys and plains of Sumatra,
Java, and Bali; another cultural complex is composed of the largely
Islamic coastal commercial sector; a third, more marginal sector
consists of the upland forest farming communities which exist by
means of subsistence swidden agriculture. To some degree, these
patterns can be linked to the geographical resources themselves,
with abundant shoreline, generally calm seas, and steady winds favoring
the use of sailing vessels, and fertile valleys and plains--at least
in the Greater Sunda Islands--permitting irrigated rice farming.
The heavily forested, mountainous interior hinders overland communication
by road or river, but fosters slash-and-burn agriculture.
Each of these patterns of ecological and economic adaptation experienced
tremendous pressures during the 1970s and 1980s, with rising population
density, soil erosion, river-bed siltation, and water pollution
from agricultural pesticides and off-shore oil drilling. In the
coastal commercial sector, for instance, the livelihood of fishing
people and those engaged in allied activities--roughly 5.6 million
people--began to be imperiled in the late 1970s by declining fish
stocks brought about by the contamination of coastal waters. Fishermen
in northern Java experienced marked declines in certain kinds of
fish catches and by the mid-1980s saw the virtual disappearance
of the terburuk fish in some areas. Effluent from fertilizer
plants in Gresik in northern Java polluted ponds and killed milkfish
fry and young shrimp. The pollution of the Strait of Malacca between
Malaysia and Sumatra from oil leakage from the Japanese supertanker
Showa Maru in January 1975 was a major environmental disaster
for the fragile Sumatran coastline. The danger of supertanker accidents
also increased in the heavily trafficked strait.
The coastal commercial sector suffered from environmental pressures
on the mainland, as well. Soil erosion from upland deforestation
exacerbated the problem of siltation downstream and into the sea.
Silt deposits covered and killed once-lively coral reefs, creating
mangrove thickets and making harbor access increasingly difficult,
if not impossible, without massive and expensive dredging operations.
Although overfishing by Japanese and American "floating factory"
fishing boats was officially restricted in Indonesia in 1982, the
scarcity of fish in many formerly productive waters remained a matter
of some concern in the early 1990s. As Indonesian fishermen improved
their technological capacity to catch fish, they also threatened
the total supply.
A different, but related, set of environmental pressures arose
in the 1970s and 1980s among the rice-growing peasants living in
the plains and valleys. Rising population densities and the consequent
demand for arable land gave rise to serious soil erosion, deforestation
because of the need for firewood, and depletion of soil nutrients.
Runoff from pesticides polluted water supplies in some areas and
poisoned fish ponds. Although national and local governments appeared
to be aware of the problem, the need to balance environmental protection
with pressing demands of a hungry population and an electorate eager
for economic growth did not diminish.
Major problems faced the mountainous interior regions of Kalimantan,
Sulawesi, and Sumatra. These problems included deforestation, soil
erosion, massive forest fires, and even desertification resulting
from intensive commercial logging--all these threatened to create
environmental disaster. In 1983 some 3 million hectares of prime
tropical forest worth at least US$10 billion were destroyed in a
fire in Kalimantan Timur Province. The disastrous scale of this
fire was made possible by the piles of dead wood left behind by
the timber industry. Even discounting the calamitous effects of
the fire, in the mid-1980s Indonesia's deforestation rate was the
highest in Southeast Asia, at 700,000 hectares per year and possibly
as much as 1 million hectares per year. Although additional deforestation
came about as a result of the government-sponsored Transmigration
Program (transmagrasi--
in uninhabited woodlands, in some cases the effects of this process
were mitigated by replacing the original forest cover with plantation
trees, such as coffee, rubber, or palm . In many areas of Kalimantan,
however, large sections of forest were cleared, with little or no
systematic effort at reforestation. Although reforestation laws
existed, they were rarely or only selectively enforced, leaving
the bare land exposed to heavy rainfall, leaching, and erosion.
Because commercial logging permits were granted from Jakarta, the
local inhabitants of the forests had little say about land use,
but in the mid-1980s, the government, through the Department of
Forestry, joined with the World
Bank to develop a forestry management plan. The efforts resulted
in the first forest inventory since colonial times, seminal forestry
research, conservation and national parks programs, and development
of a master plan by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO--)
of the United Nations (UN).
Data as of November 1992
Indonesia
National Territory: Rights and Responsibilities
The legal responsibility for Indonesia's environment continued
to be a matter of controversy in the early 1990s. Among the continuing
concerns were those expressed in 1982 during the UN Conference on
the Law of the Sea. In this conference, Indonesia sought to defend
its March 1980 claim to a 200-nautical-mile exclusive economic zone.
Based on the doctrine of the political and security unity of archipelagic
land and sea space (wawasan nusantara), the government
asserted its rights to marine and geological resources within this
coastal zone. In all, the area claimed the government, including
the exclusive economic zone, was 7.9 million square kilometers.
Indonesia also claimed as its territory all sea areas within a maritime
belt of twelve nautical miles of the outer perimeter of its islands.
All straits, bays, and waters within this belt were considered inland
seas by the government and amounted to around 93,000 square kilometers.
The Strait of Malacca--one of the most heavily traveled sea-lanes
in the world--was considered by Indonesia and Malaysia to be their
joint possession, and the two countries requested that other nations
notify their governments before moving warships through these waters.
The United States and several other nations rejected those claims,
considering the strait an international waterway.
During the 1980s and early 1990s, Indonesia was involved in territorial
disputes. One controversy concerned Indonesia's annexation of the
former colony of Portuguese Timor as Timor Timur Province in 1976,
an action which came under protest in the UN and among human rights
activists .
Another dispute involved Indonesia's conflict with Australia over
rights to the continental shelf off the coast of Timor. This problem
was resolved in 1991 by a bilateral agreement calling for joint
economic exploitation of the disputed area in the so-called "Timor
Gap." Still other controversies arose regarding overflight rights
in Irian Jaya (disputed with Papua New Guinea) and conflicting claims
to the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea by Brunei, China,
Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Indonesia played
the role of mediator in the Spratly Islands controversy .
Even as Indonesia extended its claim to territory, international
environmental groups were pressing Jakarta to accept environmental
responsibility for those territories. Indonesia was encouraged to
monitor pollution in its territorial waters and take legal action
to prevent the destruction of its rain forests. Since the late 1960s,
the government addressed increasing environmental problems by establishing
resource management programs, conducting environmental impact analyses,
developing better policy enforcement, and enacting appropriate laws
to give government officials proper authority. Despite these efforts,
overlapping competencies among government departments and legal
uncertainties about which department had what authority slowed progress
made against environmental degradation.
Data as of November 1992
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