USAID Water Team Case Study in Integrated Water Resources Management

beginnings as a frontier oil town, the ment planning. Local governments are city's economy has diversified and now also seizing the opportunity to devise Coastal zone management; acts as a magnet for migrants from more responsive development proIndonesia; integrated water resources Sulawesi and Java. The city's population grams funded with an increased share management of around 450,000 is growing by 3 of revenues retained locally under new percent per annum (which is well above decentralization laws. This is, in essence, the national average). Land use near the the beginning of a governance reform city and within the bay watershed is also that presumes increasingly localized Balikpapan is the economic hub and changing rapidly. Sixty percent of the management of resources that will gateway to Indonesia's richest province, original primary forests have been result in improved social, economic, East Kalimantan. Located one degree cleared (and the remainder is regularly and ecological outcomes for local south of the equator, the city stretches burned), large-scale oil palm and rubber communities. However, as with any along the northeastern shore of a large plantations have been established, such transition, there are very few embayment and natural harbor. shrimp and fish ponds are being roadmaps to aid navigation toward Balikpapan Bay has a surface area of developed, and new settlements have those outcomes, and very few that go some 15,000 ha within a compact total been established to accommodate rural beyond the land’s edge. watershed area of 211,456 ha. Within development. A network of roads and the overall watershed are some 56 rivers other communications infrastructure is and creeks. Much of the bay's shoreline also being developed to service ambiis still forested, with some 17,000 ha of tious long-term industrial development When USAID and the Government mangroves forming a key habitat for plans. of Indonesia first agreed to include fish and birds. Most of this development has Balikpapan Bay and watershed within The city of Balikpapan developed at occurred without regard to the ecologithe coastal resources management th the end of the 19 century following cal or aesthetic values of the bay, the project, known locally as Proyek Pesisir, discovery of large oil and gas deposits many interconnections between the that continue to be the mainstay of the watershed and the bay, or the linkages provincial economy. The city has between the bay and the future developbecome the principal regional oil ment of East Kalimantan. However, refining and transportation center due these considerations have become to its strategic location on the edge of prominent in recent debate regarding the Straits of Makassar, which provide the future of Balikpapan. Residents ready access to Java, North Asia, have begun to demand more equitable Singapore, and the Pacific. From its and inclusive approaches to developAcknowledgments