Man-made dipterocarp forest in Sumatra

Traditional plantations of Shorea javanica in southern Sumatra deserve mention on three main points:

1. it is a rare case in Indonesia of successful cultivation of an indigenous species. This species being a Dipterocarp is an even more attractive reason: Dipterocarps are in the paradoxical situation of being the largest family of timber trees in natural forests of tropical Asia but are almost never used for silvicultural purposes;
2. the tree is grown in association with many other useful trees to constitute an agroforestry system of both cash and subsistence incomes; and
3. such plantations represent a good potential for the production of natural resin in the humid tropics.