Javanese farming entrepreneurs on Batam

Javanese farming entrepreneurs on Batam

Fadli, Batam

Mardi, 35, and his wife Sutiyem, 28, from Banjarnegara regency,
Central Java province, arrived four years ago on Batam in search
of work in the special industrial zone island.

They were not seeking jobs in electronic goods assembling
plants as many other Javanese do, but to grow vegetables for
household consumption.

Mardi knew beforehand that the land in Batam was not so good
for farming, but he still wanted to give it a go because he had
seen that his fellow farmers from Banjarnegara had been
successful on Batam and he wished to follow suit.

Shortly after arriving, he bought a half hectare plot of land
-- from a local resident who did not have an ownership
certificate -- for Rp 2 million (just over US$200 at the time).
The plot is located in Tanjung Riau subdistrict, Sekupang
district, where he has grown various kinds of vegetables with his
wife for nearly four years.

"My main reason here was to farm. I knew about it from my
hometown friends who came here earlier. After I developed the
skills to farm and market the crops, I moved the rest of my
family here," Mardi told The Jakarta Post.

He uses an intercrop method -- growing a row of vegetables
alternating with a row of cayenne pepper or long beans
overlapping with gambas, a kind of tuber.

He uses water from a pond not far from his farm for watering
his crops. The pond, equipped with a water pump, is used by
several other farmers as well.

"Nearly all farmers in the Simpang Base Camp area -- around
100 of them -- come from Banjarnegara. We all know each other,"
Mardi said.

The quality of soil is not favorable, with a high bauxite
level, often hard and brownish in color. He has to mix in copious
quantities of manure and loamy soil for his vegetables to grow.

"We continually use fertilizer on the crops for better
harvests," he said.

Every day his routine varies because each crop has to be
harvested in a staggered process. Long beans take about three
weeks to harvest. He has planned it in such a way that he can
reap the beans once every three days.

He uses about a fourth of a 130 kg sack of fertilizer, which
costs Rp 115,000, in each three-week period, while a kilogram of
long beans sells for Rp 2,500. He can yield 50 kg of long beans
in a single harvest period. "Vegetable sellers from the
traditional market buy directly from us to get the best price and
the freshest beans," Mardi said.

The price of vegetables on Batam is three times higher
compared to other areas in Sumatra, so it attracts people like
him to farming on Batam.

Mardi leaves marketing matters to Sutiyem, who does most of
the harvesting as well as weighing and packaging the vegetables.
From their thriving little farming enterprise, Mardi and Sutiyem
were able to buy a simple house in their hometown as well as pay
the school fees to send their two children to elementary school.

When asked if he was worried about a lack of an ownership
certificate for his farm, he said that he would just leave it to
fate if a time came when the authorities, such as the Batam
Authority Board or the Batam municipality, decided they wanted to
reclaim it.