Urban farmers create oases

Urban farmers create oases

Zakki Hakim, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Kampung Sawah presents a rare scene amid the jungle of buildings
in the city. It has approximately eight hectares of rice and
kangkung (water spinach) fields and is located less than one
kilometer from the dense residential area of Kelapa Gading in
North Jakarta.

In the green vast fields, farmers -- men and women -- harvest
the crops, just like in an ordinary village.

Various people, from different ethnic groups such as Javanese,
Sundanese, Batak, Minangkabau and Madurese, count on these fields
for a living and form a diversified community.

Among them, a distinctive native Betawi man, whom residents
call Engkong Haji Nuran, has claimed some of the land as his
since the mid 1970s. For 86-year-old Nuran, farming is like a
dose of vitamins. He said that his body would ache badly if he
missed a day working the land where he grows rice and banana
trees all by himself.

Residents concede that the elderly man is one of the hardest
working urban farmers in the area, given that his land is the
cleanest and the most well-kept. Residents say weeds do not get a
chance to grow on Nuran's land.

Among the kangkung growers, Nur, 30, comes from Indramayu,
West Java, where he also worked as a farmer. However, he has
spent most of his time in Jakarta.

"We prefer to work as farmers in Jakarta because the income is
better. I can earn up to Rp 60,000 (approximately US$7.30) a
day," he said. Although the cost of living in his village is far
below that in Jakarta, farmers' earnings there are even lower due
to the low prices of crops, he said.

The leafy kangkung vegetable they grow is mostly sold at
Kramat Jati market in East Jakarta, while some is sold at Cakung
market, one kilometer from the fields, he said.

"We also usually sell some of the crops to door-to-door
vegetable vendors who operate around the Kelapa Gading and Cakung
residential areas," he told The Jakarta Post on Thursday.

Unlike the kangkung fields, which are dominated by farmers
from Indramayu, the rice fields are dominated by farmers from
Karawang, West Java.

However, the rice farmers seldom sell their harvests directly
to markets in the city. Instead they usually sell the rice in
Karawang because they have relatives who own mills and who pay
reasonable prices for their crops. One hundred kilograms of
threshed rice is currently priced at Rp 160,000 there, said one
farmer.

Kampung Sawah, which is located in Rawa Terate subdistrict,
Cakung, East Jakarta, is surrounded by factories that the farmers
say heavily pollute the environment.

A steel casting factory discharges yellowish brown dust that
showers the area and coats the crops. Then there is the river,
which locals utilize to irrigate the fields and which is full of
lubricant oil, diesel fuel and goodness knows what else.

"I live close to nature, it keeps me healthy," said Nuran
while his still-sharp eyes watch the dust flying above Kampung
Sawah.