The Forest Has a Voice - Part 1: Tuning In to Indonesia’s Rainforest Soundscape
By Živa Justinek, Rikardus, and Aurore Maxey
A new chapter in scalable biodiversity monitoring using AI and community-led conservation.
“The rainforest never sleeps, and now, we’re beginning to hear it.”
A camera trap in place, capturing moments of wildlife activity in the forest.
Something new is unfolding in the forests of Gunung Naning, West Kalimantan. In partnership with conservation technology experts at WildMon, Planet Indonesia is deepening its use of bioacoustic monitoring, this time integrating artificial intelligence to help analyze the forest’s soundscape while continuing to center both science and community knowledge.
This is the first step in a two-year-long monitoring project, a learning process shaped by muddy boots, long hikes, shifting weather, and long conversations under village rooftops.
A New Way of Listening
Listening to nature in Gunung Naning
Gunung Naning Protection Forest, a thick tropical rainforest that makes up part of the largest remaining continuous intact forest of the “Heart of Borneo” bioregion. It is home to a wide range of elusive, culturally important, and threatened species, including orangutans, pangolins, sun bears, hornbills, deer, wild boar, clouded leopard, and even the striking great argus pheasant. With the forest canopy alive with bird and primate calls and the undergrowth stirred by hidden mammals, it’s a landscape that speaks—if you know how to listen.
This landscape is also home to the Indigenous Dayak communities, who have nurtured a strong cultural and spiritual connection with the forest and its inhabitants for centuries.
That’s why Planet Indonesia uses bioacoustic monitoring: a method that uses small, weatherproof recorders to capture the sounds of the forest, including bird song, primate calls, and other acoustic cues of wildlife presence. This approach offers a low-impact, scalable alternative to traditional surveys and provides a clearer picture of wildlife activity over time.
This work is testing more than just new tools; it’s exploring how conservation technology can be integrated into socially protected forests through community-led processes. The goal is not just monitoring, but building a model where technology strengthens trust, supports learning, and reinforces long-term community leadership.
Importantly, this is not a top-down rollout of high-tech tools. It’s a collaboration, co-designed with WildMon, and co-implemented with the communities who live in and care for these forests.
Building the Foundation Together
Team members from Planet Indonesia prepare a bioacoustic recorder for deployment.
The work began in 2024 with joint planning sessions between Planet Indonesia’s biodiversity team and WildMon’s scientist, Dr. Tomaz Nasciento De Melo, who spent time in both the field and office, training staff.
By early 2025, the project had secured support from government partners, including the Department of Environment (DLHK), the Conservation Agency (BKSDA), and local Forest Management Units (KPH). Community members contributed from the outset, helping to identify suitable locations based on signs of wildlife and customary knowledge of the forest.
“The community knows the paths and sounds of this forest better than anyone,” said Rikardus, Planet Indonesia’s Technical Supervisor for Biodiversity. “Their input was essential in choosing where to place the devices.”
Dr. Tomaz Nasciento De Melo of WildMon and Rikardus, Planet Indonesia’s biodiversity team member, reviewing setup details during the early phase of deployment in Gunung Naning.
Into the Forest: The First Deployment
In February and March 2025, field teams made up of community members, Planet Indonesia staff, and local volunteers began installing paired bioacoustic devices and camera traps across two key villages.
From forest planning to AI analysis: How we monitor wildlife soundscapes in Gunung Naning.
Bioacoustic devices and camera traps are deployed in pairs across survey grids, designed with input from local communities.
The journey was not easy. Heavy rains made paths slippery and sometimes impassable. Equipment was carried by hand across steep ridges and narrow footpaths. Training community members, ranging from elders to youth, meant slowing down and learning together.
On one of the steeper trails, a team member pointed to scratch marks on a tree, signs the community believed could belong to a sun bear. That’s where they placed a recorder, hoping the forest might confirm what local knowledge had already suggested.
“We had to adapt, especially in teaching how to install devices and fill out monitoring forms,” said one team member. “But that shared learning is what makes this work meaningful.”
In total, 31 bioacoustic recorders and 31 camera traps were deployed during this first trip.
Field team members navigate and carry equipment through dense forest and rivers of Gunung Naning to install bioacoustic recorders.
Curiosity, Ownership, and Early Reflections
Local interest grew quickly. Community members asked questions about how the devices worked, whether they would capture human activity, and how long the batteries would last. Crucially, they asked: “Will we get to see the results?”
The answer is yes. From the beginning, this effort has been designed not only to collect data, but to share it back, supporting informed decision-making and forest governance at the community level.
Some villagers, even those not directly involved, began to see the value of the monitoring. “They felt supported in knowing what wildlife still exists in their forests,” said Rikardus. “And they want to protect it.”
For us, technology is not the centerpiece; it’s a tool. What matters most is that it’s used in a way that strengthens local leadership, respects customary knowledge, and reflects what communities want to protect.
Light filtering through Gunung Naning’s dense canopy.
Looking Ahead
This is just the beginning. The first round of data will be collected and reviewed in mid-2025, with WildMon leading the analysis and development of AI-based sound identification models. A second deployment is planned for later this year.
But the long-term goal goes far beyond monitoring. Planet Indonesia is working with communities to build a connected landscape of community-managed and customary forests in Kalimantan. Bioacoustics is just one tool in a broader approach grounded in securing rights, setting up local management, strengthening governance, and supporting livelihoods and public health.
In the next part of this series, we’ll share what we begin to hear and what communities are learning from listening to their landscapes.
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