Will the food crisis keep haunting us?

Sarono, The Indonesian NGO Network for Forest Conservation (SKEPHI), Jakarta

October 16 has been declared World Food Day. The Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries even put up a large banner in front of its office in Pancoran, South Jakarta, stating: "Enough water, food guaranteed. Enough food, welfare guaranteed".

A sufficient water supply will indeed favorably affect food availability. But Indonesia faces a dilemma in which its abundant water resources are not properly handled, causing water shortages that haunt most people almost all the time, particularly during the dry season.

This shortage eventually affects agriculture. Any disruption in agriculture leads to a delay in food supply. Indonesia has been one of the world's rice importers since 1996.

Ironically, Indonesia with its vast natural resources continues to be plagued by drought and many of its people still live in poverty. Water resource potential based on per capital national supply index stands at 15,000 cubic meters a year. By global standards, this water supply level is fairly high.

The Indonesian population, growing by 1.01 percent per annum, will reach 257 million in 2025. Of the total, 155 million are in Java, increasing the likelihood of water shortages. Java is actually the country's largest rice producing area, which is highly dependent on irrigation.

Today there are 7.1 million hectares of irrigated land. Seven thousand five hundred cubic meters of water is needed per hectare in each planting season or 2,500 cubic meters to produce one ton of rice; the reduction in reservoir levels in 2010 will reduce rice output by 300,000 tons and in 2070 by 1.74 million tons.

Central Java is the region worst stricken by drought, with a severe water crisis compared to other provinces. Almost half of Central Java's reservoirs are in a critical state. Fourteen of this region's 34 dams are also in a critical condition following the long dry spell across the archipelago.

The Ministry of Resettlement and Regional Infrastructure has also indicated that if Indonesia wanted to be free from the food crisis, irrigation networks covering 6.8 million hectares a year should be maintained. Likewise, 100,000 hectares of new irrigation channels a year should be built, 200,000 hectares of irrigation networks a year need to be repaired and reclamation of 50,000 hectares of fields a year on the 2 million hectares of land that has the potential to be irrigated must be carried out. If all this can be implemented, Indonesia will be able to strengthen its food resilience.

The conversion of agricultural land has also caused a drastic decline in Indonesia's rice production. When the property business was booming in the 1990s, land function change involved 40,000 hectares. Data from the above ministry shows that in the last 15 years, 1.77 million hectares of agricultural land in Java out of the 5.4 million hectares using technical irrigation had changed its function.

The food crisis is inseparable from erroneous policy measures in the New Order period. This was when the entire population, regardless of ethnic origin and culture/traditional wisdom, was taught and required to consume rice as a staple food.

This resulted in a gross lack of food diversification so that when rice production no longer met the demand of hundreds of millions of people, the food crisis lingered.

The New Order's attempt to boost rice production through the one-million-hectare peat land project in Central Kalimantan for conversion into paddy fields also failed. It was because the regime refused to listen when many advised that the land was technically unfit for agriculture due to its high acidity and other unfavorable environmental factors.

All the policy blunders now have to be expensively offset by the present generation. The government in 1984 was proud of its rice self sufficiency, but now Indonesia imports rice to meet domestic needs. Food diversification as an attempt to maintain food resilience has not been implemented. The government's effort to produce rice in large quantities through the green revolution flopped as well.

These realities have only made people suffer even more. Indonesia with its plentiful resources has proven unable to relieve its population of poverty and food scarcity. Its natural resources have only been exploited to serve certain groups, while state debts to be borne by its citizens are mounting.

Food diversification to safeguard food resilience is imperative. The public should no longer be forced to consume any one kind of food. Traditional wisdom that supports Indonesia's food diversification program should be heeded.