Anti-Corruption Team Probes Village Cooperatives Built on Protected Farmland in Central Java

The National Strategy for Corruption Prevention (Stranas PK) team is currently surveying and collecting data on Village Cooperatives (KDKMP) in Central Java that have been established on Sustainable Agricultural Food Land (LP2B).

Head of the Central Java Agriculture and Livestock Service (Distanak), Defrancisco Dasilva Tavares, stated that his office is assisting the Stranas PK team in the data collection process. “Today, colleagues are checking the field in Magelang, looking at several points where the cooperatives are located on agricultural land,” Frans said in an interview on Tuesday (14/7/2026).

Although he did not yet have complete data on the number of KDKMP built on LP2B or their distribution across regions, Frans indicated that the Stranas PK team likely has preliminary data guiding their field inspections. “They probably already have data on where the most cases are. So, one of them is Magelang. We are accompanying them to check if the locations are indeed on protected paddy fields (LBS),” he added.

Frans explained that, by regulation, the conversion of LP2B is strictly prohibited. Exceptions are only made for public interest and must meet several requirements, including providing replacement land two to three times the size of the converted area. This is especially strict for land with technical irrigation systems that allow for multiple harvests per year.

He revealed that Central Java is among the provinces facing a high rate of agricultural land conversion. “From 2024 to 2025, we saw a conversion of up to 17,114 hectares. That is a very high figure in just one year, even by national standards,” Frans stated. He added that the majority of the converted land was paddy fields, which were turned into buildings, including residential areas, warehouses, terminals, and even petrol stations. Given the high rate of land conversion, Frans said he understood why the Stranas PK team is conducting inspections in the province.