Forest Carbon and EUDR in Bali

Updated 2026-11-02 · 4 min read · By the akar.earth specialist team

Forest carbon in Bali: West Bali National Park, Benoa Bay mangroves, Kintamani coffee and Jembrana cocoa agroforestry, desa adat land and EUDR exposure.

Bali has a small forest estate, but it supports practical community-scale carbon work: coffee and cocoa agroforestry, upland watershed restoration and mangrove restoration around Benoa Bay and the island’s coasts. EUDR exposure is concentrated in Kintamani arabica coffee and cocoa from the west of the island.

akar.earth is based in Bali, so this is the province we know at closest range.

Forest and land cover profile

Bali is a volcanic island with a mountain chain running east to west, including Agung, Batur and the Bedugul highlands. Natural forest survives mainly along this central ridge and in the west.

• West Bali National Park (Taman Nasional Bali Barat) protects dry monsoon forest, lowland forest, savanna, mangroves and coral reefs in the north-west. It is home to the critically endangered Bali starling.
• The central highlands around Bedugul, Batukaru and Batur hold montane forest that protects the lakes and springs feeding Bali’s irrigation.
• The Batur caldera is a UNESCO Global Geopark.

The water that flows from these forests feeds the subak, Bali’s customary irrigation system, recognised as a UNESCO cultural landscape. Upland forest protection therefore has a cultural and agricultural rationale that goes well beyond carbon.

Peat and mangroves

There is no peat. The largest mangrove area is around Benoa Bay in the south, protected as Ngurah Rai Forest Park (Tahura Ngurah Rai). It is surrounded by roads, the airport, the port and tourist development, and faces waste and land reclamation pressure. Smaller mangroves occur in West Bali National Park, on Nusa Lembongan and along the north coast.

Mangrove restoration and protection are valuable in Bali for coastal defence, fisheries and tourism. Crediting is feasible only if additionality and permanence can be shown in a heavily developed coastal zone. See mangrove restoration carbon and the blue carbon hub.

Main commodities and drivers of land-use change

• Coffee: Kintamani arabica on the Batur highlands, with a geographical indication, grown under shade trees often including citrus. Robusta grows at lower elevations.
• Cocoa: smallholder cocoa in Jembrana and Tabanan.
• Clove, coconut and vanilla: widespread; not EUDR commodities.

The main driver of land-use change in Bali is tourism and housing development converting rice fields, gardens and coastal land. Forest encroachment is smaller in scale but present in the uplands.

Which carbon project types fit

For cocoa and coffee systems, see cocoa agroforestry carbon and the agroforestry hub.

EUDR exposure

Coffee and cocoa are Bali’s EUDR commodities. Volumes are small compared with Sumatra or Sulawesi, but many Bali coffee and cocoa exporters sell to specialty buyers in Europe who expect plot-level traceability.

Most gardens were established long before 2020 on long-cultivated land, so deforestation risk is low. The work is in the data: plot geolocation for each farmer, documented land status, and segregation from beans bought elsewhere. Coffee traded through Bali sometimes includes beans from other islands, which must be traced separately. See EUDR and coffee and EUDR and cocoa.

Customary villages and land

Bali has two parallel village systems: the administrative village (desa dinas) and the customary village (desa adat). The desa adat governs temples, ceremonies and much communal land under customary law (awig-awig). Temple land and some forests have sacred status.

Projects need consent from the desa adat as well as landowners and government. Permenhut 6/2026 recognises customary communities and social forestry groups as legitimate carbon participants, and Bali has several village forest and community forest licences in its upland forest estate. See social forestry carbon.

Tourism, water and land prices

Bali’s land market is unlike any other province. Land near the coast and in popular upland areas sells at prices that make long-term tree planting hard to justify on carbon income alone. Projects work best where land use is already agricultural and stable, such as coffee and cocoa gardens, and where carbon payments add to crop income rather than replace it. Water is the stronger local argument. Lakes Batur, Bratan, Buyan and Tamblingan depend on forested catchments, and hotels, farmers and the subak all draw on the same water. Watershed programmes that combine corporate funding from the tourism sector with community tree planting can deliver real benefits even where formal crediting is not viable. If credits are the goal, the ARR carbon estimator gives a first view of likely volumes, which on small Bali plots are often modest.

Practical next steps

Start with a tenure and consent map that includes the desa adat. Combine farm mapping for EUDR and carbon. Compare with East Java and West Nusa Tenggara, and see the forest carbon hub.