No foundation for stakeholder participation existed at Bunaken when NRMP began field work in 

1992.  Facilitation of a participatory planning process thus became difficult.  Field staff intended 

to work with local Manado based NGO's.  However, these NGO's had insufficient experience 

with natural resources management, conservation awareness, and community organizing.  

From among the twenty NGO representatives invited to participate in NRMP's first three week 

community awareness program, only five completed the program.  These five were then 

recruited as NRMP field workers.  Over time, they formed their own NGO and named it KELOLA 

(Kelompok Pengelolaan Sumber Daya Alam, the Natural Resources Management Group).  

KELOLA's staff hoped to provide a bridge between the formal park management administration 

(UPT) and local communities.  

Given their enthusiasm for the participatory nature of the Bunaken National Park management 

plan and developing skills as field assistants during the planning process, KELOLA staff had 

great potential as active participants in Park management. However, this would only be possible 

with a long term financial commitment to KELOLA's continued involvement.  One shortcoming 

of NRMP was that, while it professed local NGO institutional strengthening, no measures were 

taken to maintain long term NGO effectiveness beyond the project period.  Thus, while KELOLA 

developed the skills to support the management of Bunaken National Park, they lacked the 

financial resources to do so.  Like most other NGO's in Indonesia, KELOLA must engage in a 

project to project approach for institutional survival. KELOLA must focus on opportunities 

presented by funding agencies, and can only pursue Bunaken National Park management 

activities if those agencies provide support.  

Beyond seeking NGO involvement, NRMP field work in Bunaken focused on four specific 

entities of the national park community; namely: i) national government officials from PHPA, ii) 

provincial level government officials from Bappeda and other agencies, iii) tour operators 

working within Bunaken's scuba diving industry, and iv) people living in or adjacent to the park.  

The provincial and local level government agencies were regularly consulted during 

development of the management plan. Tour operators worked together to agree on tourist 

diving zones and diving protocol within the national park.  Input was sought from people living in 

and around the park to determine appropriate utilization and protection zones. However, in 

many respects relevant to management issues, each of these groups was treated 

independently.  Few clear examples were available of participatory planning forums, with 

representatives from the various stakeholder groups working together in a participatory manner. 

As the project matured, more and more time and energy was focused on the people living in or 

adjacent to the national park.  Spearheaded by the efforts of NRMP field staff, a number of 

 community based  field projects were initiated.  Projects included a formal Participatory Rural 

Appraisal (PRA) training workshop, a community based ecotourism project, a Sloping 

Agricultural Land Techniques (SALT) project, a sustainable mangrove management study, and 

a seaweed study.  The intention of these projects was to further involve the immediate local 

communities in resources management.  This was approached through the provision of income 

generating opportunities (e.g., ecotourism and SALT) and active involvement in resources 

management (e.g., sustainable mangrove management). 

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