Officials warned on food shortage danger
JAKARTA (JP): The government is on alert for possible food shortages, especially in remote areas, which could threaten political stability, State Logistics Agency chief Beddu Amang said yesterday.
"Adequate supplies of reasonably priced food will improve the public's feeling of security; something the nation has always cherished," Beddu said in Sampit, Central Kalimantan while opening a Rp 1.1 billion (US$448,000) logistical storehouse.
He said the country's food supplies were concentrated in the agency's storehouses in towns, and that it was often problematic to transport food to areas that urgently needed it.
Beddu's statement came amid reports of a devastating dry spell across Indonesia. The rainy season will not begin until November, according to the meteorology and geophysics agency.
Drought has severely affected food crops in many rice- producing areas in Java, West Nusa Tenggara, Sumatra, Central Kalimantan and South Sulawesi.
Water levels in major reservoirs in Java, dubbed Indonesia's rice bowl because it produces most of the country's rice, are reported to have dropped sharply.
Beddu said the Sampit logistical storehouse was opened to speed up the supply of food to remote areas.
The government is planning to build Rp 11.5 billion (US$4.6 million) harvest treatment facilities at the experimental one- million-hectare peat moss farmland project in Central Kalimantan.
The facilities will be used to store farmers' produce. Similar facilities are under construction in Central Kalimantan's North Barito and Kapuas regencies.
The government hopes the facilities will help raise Central Kalimantan's rice production from 10,000 tons to at least 20,000 tons a year.
Antara reported that in Purwakarta, West Java, over 60 hectares of paddies in Manis and Tegalwaru subdistricts had dried up because of drought. Hundreds of hectares of paddies in other parts of the regency are feared to wilt soon.
"We have no hope of our investment yielding anything because water is getting scarce," a farmer said.
In Cikaobandung village, farmers are so desperate that they have built a dam across the badly polluted Cinangka river in a bid to save their paddies.
In hilly southern Purwakarta people have complained of scarce drinking water.
Drought is also threatening tobacco crops in Jember, East Java.
The meteorology and geophysics agency in Jakarta has warned that inadequate rainfall may harm the quality of the famous Besuki Na Oogst tobacco.
Jember tobacco farmers do not use irrigation systems so they must rely on rain and groundwater.
In Jakarta, the director general for water resources development, Soeparmono, said Thursday that severe drought had long been expected but many farmers had ignored the government's advice on how to minimize losses due to water shortages.
"Farmers enthusiastically planted paddies in areas expected to suffer water shortages although the government had advised them otherwise," he said. (pan)