Indonesia-based Filipino researcher Joshua Vidal makes rare field entry into Jambuk Village, East Kalimantan

“To the best of my knowledge, I may be the first Filipino researcher to conduct fieldwork in this village,” Joshua Vidal said.

JAMBUK VILLAGE, Kutai Barat, East Kalimantan — An Indonesia-based Filipino researcher has documented field narratives on Indigenous knowledge, education and human–nature coexistence in Jambuk Village, a community in Bongan district, Kutai Barat Regency, on the island of Borneo.

(from left) Joshua Vidal, Dayak informant, Prof Dane | Pampang in Samarinda

Joshua Vidal, accompanied with Prof. Dane (utmost right part of the photo), who conducted the visit as part of a broader field inquiry in East Kalimantan, said the journey marked what he believes to be a pioneering milestone: his arrival in Jambuk as an Indonesia-based Filipino researcher working directly in the village. Vidal’s fieldwork also included Pampang in Samarinda, where he examined how communities describe the forest not only as a source of livelihood but as memory, inheritance and relationship.

The reporting comes at a time when East Kalimantan remains under significant environmental pressure. World Bank-linked Forest Carbon Partnership materials have noted substantial forest loss in the province over the past decade, driven largely by oil palm expansion, timber plantations, mining and fires. The same body of work has also identified East Kalimantan as a major site for efforts to reduce deforestation and forest degradation.

In Jambuk Village, Vidal said one of the most important parts of the visit was a conversation with a local teacher, or guro, whose narration framed education not simply as classroom instruction but as the formation of character, thought and respect. According to Vidal’s account, the teacher described learning as inseparable from community life and from the obligation to live responsibly with nature.

The field visit also included participation in the harvesting of Munyau, a type of rice that Vidal described as distinctive because it does not rely on irrigation in the way rice is commonly understood to do. He said the experience offered a direct encounter with local agricultural knowledge and showed how ecological understanding is carried through practice as much as through explanation.

Researchers and international institutions have increasingly pointed to the importance of Indigenous and local knowledge in climate adaptation, biodiversity governance and sustainability. UNESCO and IPBES have both argued that such knowledge systems are not relics of the past but living frameworks that can inform environmental decision-making and long-term resilience.

For Vidal, the significance of Jambuk went beyond data gathering. He said the village encounter showed that tradition in East Kalimantan is not simply disappearing under modern pressure, but being negotiated and carried forward through education, agriculture and everyday communal life.

The visit adds to broader discussions about how Indigenous communities in East Kalimantan continue to sustain knowledge under conditions of rapid environmental and social change. Across Indonesia, Indigenous peoples still face land pressure, incomplete recognition and conflict linked to development and extractive activity, according to the International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs.

Vidal said the experience in Jambuk Village underscored a wider lesson: that sustainability is not only a matter of policy or conservation planning, but also of how communities teach belonging, restraint and respect across generations.

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