Farmers and rural agrarian resources protection are vital amid pandemic

Over the past weeks, we have witnessed countries restricting food exports in response to the COVID-19 pandemic despite calls from experts to keep the food supply chain open. Those countries include major rice exporters such as Vietnam and Thailand, which Indonesia normally import rice from.

While the data from the Agriculture Ministry suggests that our rice stocks still exceed consumption until the end of May, it is difficult to predict when the food trade will return to normal as countries struggle with the pandemic and strategize on ensuring their own food supplies.

Amid import difficulties, the State Logistics Agency turned to local farmers for supply with a plan of procuring 950,000 tons of rice to ensure stocks will be available until the end of this year. So far, harvests in several rice-producing regions have shown quite good results. In Banten, for instance, it is estimated that yields may reach surpluses of 160,132 until October. Farmers in Purwakarta also produced 12,000 tons extra rice this month. Futhermore, regions outside of Java such as Aceh and Central Sulawesi are also estimated to have rice surplus until June.

That being said, experts have warned climate-related issues and the COVID-19 outbreak may threaten agricultural productivity in the following months. Some studies have shown that climate change may cause a 19 percent decline in grains yields, including rice. At the same time, yields in the second harvest season are usually only around 35 percent of total yearly production due to drought. Furthermore, the spread of pandemic have caused investment decline in agricultural sector and may further cut the number of agricultural workers available. As such, we may expect depletion of rice stocks at the end of the year and even critical supply in early 2021.

For that reason, government must quickly act to prevent the health and economic crisis turning into food crisis. Steps that must be taken should focus on safeguarding agricultural production, which generally take place in rural areas. In the face of pandemic, this means two things. First, preventing further spread of COVID-19 outbreak in rural areas. Second, ensuring the well-being and safety of farmer families by minimizing the socio-economic impacts of pandemic so that farmers could continue farming.

The Ministry of Villages, Disadvantaged Regions and Transmigration has acted on the matter by issuing a COVID-19 management protocol. As of mid-April, more than twenty thousand villages have formed pandemic prevention teams with a half million of volunteers joining the task force nationally. Their tasks range from informing and alerting communities on the pandemic to performing COVID-19 symptoms check. The task force will also identify village facilities that could be used for isolation purposes.

The ministry has also issued Ministerial Regulation No. 6 of 2020 regulating the use of village funds for direct cash assistance for COVID-19 affected rural communities. Budget reallocation of 22.4 trillion rupiah had been made and the money will be distributed to 74,953 villages nationwide. The financial assistance is expected to ease the economic burden of 12,487,646 families who will each receive Rp. 600,000 cash. Those measures are already in accordance with elements contained in the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization’s policy brief on COVID-19 response and social protection in rural areas.

Regional governments must immediately follow up on the central government’s policy by finalizing the data of citizens that are eligible for the cash assistance and make sure that the money would be received by rural communities, especially those who belong to vulnerable groups, such as informal workers and small farmers. Regional governments at all levels have to coordinate in monitoring the social assistance distribution progress at the village level. Government at least should provide mechanisms for citizens to submit inquiries regarding the social assistance. For instance, West Java government has developed a smartphone-based application serving as a platform for government-citizen communication in response to pandemic spread in the region. The app has been recently upgraded with a feature for submitting social assistance-related complaints. Such monitoring mechanism may become a model for other regional governments.

In addition to those measures, government must seriously resolve agrarian conflicts that often put farmers face to face with police and armed forces. The Consortium for Agrarian Reform has noted nine agrarian conflicts that took place in a time of pandemic in Indonesia. Cases of eviction and criminalization of farmers in opposition to corporate activities and development projects have happened in various regions, from North Sumatra to South Sulawesi. Some of these conflicts have taken the lives of farmers, such as the case in Pagar Batu Village in South Sumatra’s Lahat Regency.

In the short term, prevention of conflicts escalation should be done by stopping the criminalization of farmers who are defending their agricultural lands and livelihood as well as urging corporations to suspend any operation and construction activity on disputed lands in a time of crisis.

The House of Representatives must also consider postponing the deliberation of the omnibus bill draft, which hints risks of further marginalization of farmers and poses threats toward rural agrarian resources. It is very difficult for farmers to concentrate on farming if they have to repeatedly organize protests in the struggle to defend their rights.

In the long run, policies on agrarian reform must be reformulated so that they entail programs beyond issuance of land certificates. What the government has done so far is merely certification of lands that are clearly owned by farmers. Current agrarian reform initiatives have not yet resolved land disputes and returned lands that have been seized from indigenous communities and farmers. This, of course, could wait until we manage to harvest enough rice to meet this year’s need – but not until the next pandemic.