Last refugium of a critically endangered species: Three decades of conservation

Dr Mochamad Indrawan is a trained ecologist and conservation biologist with more than three decades of field experience. He works with the Research Center for Climate Change and the Department of Geography in the Faculty of Sciences at Universitas Indonesia. He is also a 2026 CDU Visiting Fellow.

The Banggai Crow (Corvus unicolor), is one of the world’s most threatened endemic species. The bird survives in an increasingly fragmented refugium within the Banggai Archipelago, Central Sulawesi. The Banggai Crow case outlines the challenges of conserving range-restricted island endemics and highlights the urgency of protecting the last remaining refugium before further habitat degradation becomes irreversible.

In this seminar, Indrawan will share three decades of conservation efforts, documenting the species' distribution, habitat, and main threats, including forest loss, farm-land expansion, and limited public awareness. He will elaborate on inclusive conservation interventions, highlight lessons learned from community engagement, and identify priorities for future action.

Indrawan's voluntary rainforest conservation work has since 2007 included continuous facilitation of indigenous peoples and local communities (IPLC) whose joint endeavour is focused on the establishment of community conservation areas, and IPLC-led forest restoration. His research on Japanese socio-ecological systems (satoyama) during his past tenure as an Asian Public Intellectual (API) Senior Fellow resulted in cross-country comparisons with Indonesian agroforestry systems.

Indrawan has served as a member of two International Union for Conservation of Nature specialist groups – the World Commission on Protected Areas and the Red List Authority. He has also served on the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services as a member of the Capacity Building Task Force and a contributor to diversified knowledge systems, as well as policy support tools and methodologies.