Govt to give Rp 5 million to voluntary transmigrants

JAKARTA (JP): Families that volunteer to resettle in the giant peat-land project in Central Kalimantan will each get a Rp 5 million (US$2,174) incentive from the government, Minister of Transmigration Siswono Yudohusodo said yesterday

Speaking at Merdeka Palace, after meeting President Soeharto, Siswono said 3,000 transmigrants would be settled this fiscal year (1996/1997), while another 20,000 families would be sent next fiscal year.

Siswono met Soeharto to report on the huge project's development, which involves converting one million hectares of peat land into rice fields and other food crop estates.

He was accompanied by other members of the project's special management team. The team is headed by State Minister of National Development Planning Ginandjar Kartasasmita.

Other team members are Minister of Public Works Radinal Moochtar, Minister of Agriculture Sjarifudin Baharsjah, State Minister of Agrarian Affairs Soni Harsono, State Minister of Environment Sarwono Kusumaatmadja and Central Kalimantan Governor Warsito Rasman.

Siswono said transmigrants resettled under the government's transmigration program usually got Rp 18 million per family, while voluntary transmigrants have never before got government money.

Sjarifudin said the project was developing well and would help Indonesia to regain rice self-sufficiency.

He said if the peat-land rice fields could harvest five tons of unhusked rice, the 638,000 hectares of planned rice fields would yield at least 3.2 million tons of rice annually.

The peat moss project is this year's most expensive development project, costing about Rp 5 billion (US$2.1 million). To convert a hectare of peat land into agricultural land costs about Rp 5 million.

The government has already spent Rp 527.2 billion building the required infrastructure.

Indonesia, a significant rice producer, returned to importing rice in late 1994 after bad weather harmed domestic harvests. The country first reached rice self-sufficiency in 1984.

Last year, Indonesia produced 49 million tons of unhusked rice, up from 46.4 million tons in 1994 and 48.14 million tons in 1993.

Despite statements that the peat-land project developing well, there has been some concern over the environmental effects of the project.

Earlier this year, Radinal Moochtar revealed the project was facing irrigation problems. Land surface in some places is very high, making it technically complicated and expensive to build irrigation dams. (pwn)