| Full title | Undang-Undang Nomor 41 Tahun 1999 tentang Kehutanan |
|---|---|
| Citation | UU 41/1999; Lembaran Negara 1999 No. 167, Tambahan Lembaran Negara No. 3888 |
| Jurisdiction | Indonesia |
| Enacted by | President of Indonesia with the House of Representatives |
| Signed | 30 September 1999 |
| Promulgated | 30 September 1999 |
| Effective | 30 September 1999 |
| Replaces | Undang-Undang 5/1967 on the basic provisions of forestry; Boschordonnantie Java en Madoera 1927 |
| Amended by | Perppu 1/2004 (enacted by UU 19/2004); UU 11/2020; Perppu 2/2022 (enacted by "UU 6/2023") |
Undang-Undang 41/1999 (Undang-Undang Nomor 41 Tahun 1999 tentang Kehutanan) is the Indonesian statute on forestry. It sets out the state's control of forests, the classification of forests by status and function, and the framework for forest planning, management, protection, supervision, community rights, dispute settlement and criminal enforcement. It was enacted and promulgated on 30 September 1999, replacing Law 5/1967 on the basic provisions of forestry and the colonial forest ordinance for Java and Madura of 1927.[1][2] It is the principal statute of forestry and land use regulation in Indonesia.
The law places all forests and the natural wealth in them under the control of the state, which it distinguishes from ownership, and divides forests into state forest and forest subject to rights, and by function into conservation, protection and production forest.[3][4][5] Forest management covers forest structuring and management planning, utilisation and the use of forest areas, rehabilitation and reclamation, and protection and nature conservation.[6] The law has been amended several times, by an emergency regulation of 2004 on mining in forest areas and by the job-creation legislation of 2020 and 2022, and a Constitutional Court decision of 2013 changed how its provisions on customary forest are read.[1:1][7][8]
Its implementing rules include Government Regulation 23/2021 on the organisation of forestry, and ministerial regulations on conservation cooperation and on changes to forest function cite it as a legal basis.[9][10][11] CRPG's regulatory tracker published two analyses of the law on 26 November 2025, one of them in a series on carbon and climate regulation.[12][13]
The preamble states that forests, as a gift entrusted to the nation and a determinant of the life-support system, were declining in condition, and that Law 5/1967 no longer matched the principles of control and administration of forests or the demands of the time.[14] The general elucidation explains that state control is not ownership but authority given to the government to regulate and administer forests, forest areas and forest products, to designate forest areas and change their status, and to regulate legal relations between people and forests; matters of great strategic importance require the approval of the House of Representatives.[5:1][3:1]
Pasal 2 lists the principles of forestry administration as benefit and sustainability, populism, justice, togetherness, openness and integration. Pasal 3 sets its aims, among them ensuring forests of adequate extent and proportional distribution, optimising the conservation, protection and production functions, and improving the carrying capacity of watersheds.[15]
Pasal 1 defines a forest as an ecosystem of land containing living natural resources dominated by trees, and a forest area (kawasan hutan) as a specific area determined by the government to be kept as permanent forest.[16] By status, forest is either state forest (hutan negara), on land not subject to land rights, or forest subject to rights (hutan hak).[16:1][4:1] The original text treated customary forest (hutan adat) as state forest within the territory of a customary law community; following Constitutional Court Decision 35/PUU-X/2012, customary forest is defined as forest within such a territory and is excluded from state forest.[8:1]
By function, forests are conservation forest, protection forest or production forest (Pasal 6). Protection forest (hutan lindung) has the main function of protecting life-support systems: regulating water, preventing floods, controlling erosion, preventing seawater intrusion and maintaining soil fertility. Conservation forest comprises nature reserve areas, nature conservation areas and hunting parks, to which the rules of Law 5/1990 on conservation also apply (Pasal 7). The government may designate forest areas for special purposes, such as research, education and religious or cultural use, without changing their main function (Pasal 8).[16:2][4:2]
Forest administration (pengurusan hutan) comprises forest planning, forest management, research, education and extension, and supervision (Pasal 10). Forest planning in turn comprises forest inventory, the gazettement of forest areas (pengukuhan kawasan hutan), the allocation of forest area functions, the formation of forest management regions and the preparation of forest plans (Pasal 12).[17] Inventory is carried out at national, regional, watershed and management unit level, and its results serve as the basis for gazettement, forest resource accounts, forest plans and the forestry information system.[17:1]
As amended in 2022, gazettement proceeds through designation, boundary marking, mapping and determination, takes account of spatial plans, and uses information technology and geographic or satellite coordinates, with priority for strategic areas.[18] Management regions are formed at provincial, district and unit level, the smallest being the forest management unit.[19] The central government sets and maintains an adequate extent of forest area and forest cover for each watershed or island, and a government regulation governs the area to be maintained, including where national strategic projects are located.[20] Changes to the allocation or function of forest areas are decided by the central government on the basis of integrated research.[21]
Forest utilisation aims at optimal benefit for the welfare of the whole community while preserving the forest, and may take place in all forest areas except strict nature reserves and the core and wilderness zones of national parks.[22] As amended, utilisation of protection forest may take the form of use of the area, environmental services or the collection of non-timber products, and utilisation of production forest may also include timber harvesting; both require a business permit from the central government.[23] Utilisation of protection and production forest may also be carried out through social forestry (perhutanan sosial), granted to individuals, forest farmer groups and cooperatives, and enterprises holding utilisation permits must cooperate with local community cooperatives.[24]
Forest areas may be used for development outside forestry only in production and protection forest, without changing their main function, through borrow-use (pinjam pakai) granted by the central government with limits on area and duration. Open-pit mining is prohibited in protection forest.[25] Mining permits and agreements in forest areas that predated the law remain valid until they expire, under provisions added by the emergency regulation of 2004.[26]
Forest and land rehabilitation aims to restore, maintain and improve the function of forest and land, through reforestation, greening, maintenance, enrichment planting and soil conservation on critical and unproductive land, in all forests except strict nature reserves and national park core zones; it follows local biophysical conditions and favours participatory approaches.[27] Anyone who owns, manages or uses critical or unproductive forest must rehabilitate it. Use of forest areas that damages forest must be followed by reclamation or rehabilitation, mining permit holders must reclaim former mining areas, and users that change the land surface must pay a reclamation and rehabilitation guarantee.[27:1][28] The ten-year and annual rehabilitation plans are now prepared under Permen LHK 10/2022.[29]
Forest protection aims to prevent and limit damage from people, livestock, fire, natural forces, pests and disease, and to uphold the rights of the state, communities and individuals over forests and forest products.[30] As amended, permit holders must protect the forest in their work areas, prevent fire and answer for fires within them, and forest subject to rights is protected by the right holder.[30:1] Pasal 50 prohibits, among other acts, the unlawful occupation or use of forest areas, burning forests, harvesting forest products without a right or approval, and removing wildlife and plants from forest areas without approval.[31] Certain forestry officials hold special police powers to patrol, inspect transport documents and arrest suspects caught in the act.[32]
Customary law communities, so long as they exist in fact and are recognised, may collect forest products for their daily needs, manage forests under their customary law, and receive empowerment; their existence and dissolution are confirmed by regional regulation (Pasal 67).[33] The Constitutional Court has reviewed these provisions several times. According to the annotations in the consolidated text, Decision 35/PUU-X/2012, granted in part on 16 May 2013, removed the word negara from the definition of customary forest, struck out Pasal 5 ayat (2), which had made customary forest a form of state forest, and required Pasal 5 ayat (1) to be read as excluding customary forest from state forest.[8:2] Decision 34/PUU-IX/2011, granted in part on 16 July 2012, required state control under Pasal 4 ayat (3) to protect, respect and fulfil the rights of customary law communities and rights granted under legislation, and Decision 45/PUU-IX/2011, granted on 21 February 2012, concerned the phrase "designated and or" (ditunjuk dan atau) in the definition of forest area.[34]
The public is entitled to enjoy the environmental quality forests produce, to know forest plans and information, to give input and to supervise forestry development; people in and around forests may claim compensation for losing access to forests they depended on because of forest area designation.[35] Communities may bring representative actions (gugatan perwakilan) for forest damage that harms their lives, limited to claims about forest management contrary to the law.[36] Forestry disputes may be settled in or out of court by voluntary choice, but out-of-court settlement does not apply to crimes under the law.[37] Designated civil servants act as investigators alongside the police.[38]
As amended in 2022, Pasal 78 sets penalties for the prohibited acts, including up to ten years' imprisonment and a fine of up to Rp7.5 billion for open-pit mining in protection forest or unlawful occupation of forest areas, and up to fifteen years and Rp7.5 billion for deliberately burning forest; fines on corporations are increased by one third.[39] Unlawful acts also create liability for compensation to the state for rehabilitation, and permit holders that breach other rules are subject to administrative sanctions.[40]
The consolidated text records three amending instruments and one partial revocation. Emergency Regulation (Perppu) 1/2004, in force from 11 March 2004 and enacted as Law 19/2004, added the transitional provisions on pre-existing mining permits. Law 18/2013 on the prevention and eradication of forest destruction, in force from 6 August 2013, revoked part of the law. Perppu 2/2022 on job creation, in force from 30 December 2022, rewrote many provisions, including those on gazettement, forest adequacy, utilisation, protection, prohibitions and penalties.[7:1] The official database also lists Law 11/2020 on job creation and Law 6/2023, which enacted Perppu 2/2022, among the amending instruments.[1:2] The law now works through Government Regulation 23/2021, which consolidated its implementing regulations on planning, changes of allocation and function, use of forest areas, utilisation, social forestry and protection.[9:1]
K184 · Work URI /akn/id/act/uu/1999/41 · RegVault UU_41_1999[P] UU No. 41 Tahun 1999, JDIH BPK: enacted and promulgated in Jakarta on 30 September 1999, in force the same day, Lembaran Negara 1999 No. 167, Tambahan Lembaran Negara No. 3888; amended by UU 19/2004, UU 11/2020, Perppu 2/2022 and UU 6/2023; revokes UU 5/1967; records Constitutional Court Decision 95/PUU-XII/2014 on Pasal 50 ayat (3) huruf e and i. https://peraturan.bpk.go.id/Details/45373/uu-no-41-tahun-1999 The same dates and numbers, and the signature of President B. J. Habibie, appear at https://peraturan.go.id/id/uu-no-41-tahun-1999. ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 83 and 84. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 4 and its elucidation. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎ ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 5, 6, 7 and 8 and the elucidation of Pasal 7. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, general elucidation (Penjelasan Umum). regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎ ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 21. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, held text: a consolidation "as amended by" Perppu 1/2004 (in force 11 March 2004) and Perppu 2/2022 (in force 30 December 2022), "as partly revoked by" UU 18/2013 (in force 6 August 2013), annotated with Constitutional Court Decisions 34/PUU-IX/2011, 45/PUU-IX/2011, 35/PUU-X/2012 and 95/PUU-XII/2014. The held text does not include the closing formula. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎ ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, held consolidated text, annotations to Pasal 1 angka 6, Pasal 4 ayat (3), Pasal 5 ayat (1) to (3) and the elucidation of Pasal 5 ayat (1), citing Constitutional Court Decision 35/PUU-X/2012. regulation_id UU_41_1999. Decision date and outcome ("granted in part", decided 16 May 2013) from the Constitutional Court case database (mkri.db), case 35/PUU-X/2012. ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎
[P] Peraturan Pemerintah Nomor 23 Tahun 2021 tentang Penyelenggaraan Kehutanan, Mengingat angka 2 (citing UU 41/1999 as amended by UU 19/2004) and Pasal 300 and 301. regulation_id PP_23_2021. ↩︎ ↩︎
[P] Peraturan Menteri Kehutanan Nomor P.85/Menhut-II/2014, Mengingat (UU 41/1999 as amended by UU 19/2004). regulation_id PERMENHUT_85_2014. ↩︎
[P] Peraturan Menteri Kehutanan Nomor P.34/Menhut-II/2010, Mengingat (UU 41/1999 as amended by UU 19/2004). regulation_id PERMENHUT_34_2010. ↩︎
[E] "UU 41/1999 Forestry Law Recognizes Forests' Carbon Sequestration Function", CRPG regulatory tracker, crpg.id, 26 November 2025. https://crpg.id/uu-41-1999-forestry-law-recognizes-forests-carbon-sequestration-function/ (free sign-in required on crpg.id) The post carries a notice that it is AI-generated; it is cited for the record of the development, not for its legal content. ↩︎
[E] "What Forestry Framework Exists Under UU 41/1999?", CRPG regulatory tracker, crpg.id, 26 November 2025. https://crpg.id/what-forestry-framework-exists-under-uu-41-1999/ (free sign-in required on crpg.id) The post carries a notice that it is AI-generated; it is cited for the record of the development, not for its legal content. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, preamble, Menimbang huruf a to e. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 2 and 3. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 1 angka 2 to 9. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 10, 12, 13, 14 and 16. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎ ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 15 as amended by Perppu 2/2022. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 17 and its elucidation. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 18 as amended by Perppu 2/2022. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 19 as amended by Perppu 2/2022. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 23 and 24. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 26 and 28 as amended by Perppu 2/2022. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 29A, 29B and 30 as amended by Perppu 2/2022. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 38 as amended by Perppu 2/2022, and its elucidation. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 83A and 83B, inserted by Perppu 1/2004. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 40, 41, 42 and 43. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎ ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 45. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] Peraturan Menteri Lingkungan Hidup dan Kehutanan Nomor 10 Tahun 2022, Pasal 1 angka 1, 4 and 5 and Pasal 2. regulation_id PERMENLHK_10_2022. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 46 and 47, and Pasal 48 and 49 as amended by Perppu 2/2022. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎ ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 50 as amended by Perppu 2/2022. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 51. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 67 and its elucidation. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, held consolidated text, annotations to Pasal 1 angka 3 (Decision 45/PUU-IX/2011) and Pasal 4 ayat (3) (Decision 34/PUU-IX/2011). regulation_id UU_41_1999. Decision dates and outcomes from the Constitutional Court case database (mkri.db), cases 34/PUU-IX/2011 ("granted in part", 16 July 2012) and 45/PUU-IX/2011 ("granted", 21 February 2012). ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 68 and 69. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 71. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 74 and 75. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 77. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 78 ayat (1), (3), (4) and (11) as amended by Perppu 2/2022. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎
[P] UU 41/1999, Pasal 80 as amended by Perppu 2/2022. regulation_id UU_41_1999. ↩︎