By: Blandina Isabella Patty (Communication & ESD Officer WWF-Indonesia Papua Program)

December is the National Planting Month, during which many activities are themed around planting trees. WWF-Indonesia Papua Program also took part in the moment by conducting tree planting activities last Friday (02/12). The tree planting activity was located in one of the critical lands in Jayapura City which is included in the Cycloop Nature Reserve Buffer Zone. A total of 5,000 tree seedlings were planted in an area of 5 hectares.

The tree planting activity involved Panda Mobile volunteers and a number of students in Jayapura City. They were assigned to help record and monitor the progress of the planted trees through their android operating system smart phones. Prior to the planting of the 5,000 trees, a two-day geo tagging training was conducted for Panda Mobile Papua volunteers. This training introduced a new application called ODK Collect which serves to monitor the progress of the planted trees. Rian Setiawan, IT and database Coordinator WWF-Indonesia Papua Program introduced and taught how to use the application to the Panda Mobile volunteers.

In a fairly short time, the volunteers were immediately familiar and able to use the ODK Collect application. The training was conducted directly at the planting site of 5,000 tree seedlings in Bhayangkara 3, Jayapura so that the volunteers could immediately put it into practice. The geo tagging process is not too difficult. After filling in some content, such as the type of tree seedlings planted, the location of the planting, the number of trees planted, and a photo of the tree, the tree coordinate location data will automatically be stored on the server so that it can be monitored at any time.

After understanding how to use the application, the volunteers took the initiative to try the ODK Collect application directly on the trees they planted. The scorching sun did not dampen the spirit of these young people from the Land of Papua. The knowledge they had gained from the training was then used in the 5,000 tree planting activity on Friday (02/12) at the same location. The planting of 5,000 trees was attended by all civil servants from several agencies in Jayapura City.

This planting activity is a collaboration between WWF-Indonesia Papua Program with Jayapura City Government and BPDAS Membramo. For the first time, history records the planting of a large number of seedlings in Jayapura, totaling 5,000 seedlings consisting of mahogany, merbau, matoa, and white teak tree seedlings. This activity was opened with remarks from Daniel Pahabol S.Pd, MM as PLT Mayor of Jayapura.

After the speech, the participants of the tree planting activity walked in an orderly manner to the location. On each planting path, trained Panda Mobile volunteers were ready to carry out data collection tasks using the ODK Collect application. They visited each tree seedling that had been planted and conducted the geo tagging process.

Since there were quite a lot of trees planted, the geo tagging process took quite a long time until late afternoon. However, this did not dampen the enthusiasm of the young volunteers to record every tree seedling planted. "For the sake of green Jayapura!" they exclaimed occasionally to encourage each other.