The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has warned that the COVID-19 pandemic is posing a severe hazard to food security and nutrition, and has advised governments and other stakeholders to build more resistant food systems.
As a preventive procedure, the Indonesian Federal government is establishing a food estate project in Kapuas district and Belanti Siam town in Pulang Pisau district, Central Kalimantan province, under the National Strategic Program (PSN), which is to be executed within the next 3 years.
In 2020, at least 30 thousand hectares of land will be made available for the task, and the land size will be broadened over the next 2 years.
The President has appointed 3 ministers– Defense Minister Prabowo Susanto, Public Works and Public Housing Minister Basuki Hadimuljono, and State Enterprises Minister Erick Thohir– to execute the program, with the assistance of other ministers.
The Ministry of Defense is leading the program to build food reserves and will be accountable for increasing durability for food security.
” The other day, I informed you that the food estate advancement is being performed in response to an FAO (Food and Farming Organization) caution of a global food crisis. Thus, we require to take precautionary steps quickly by preparing tactical food reserves,” President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) informed the press on July 13, 2020.
Jokowi has justified his decision to job the Defense Minister with leading the execution of the national food estate program.
” Defense does not just issue ‘alutsista’ (main weaponry defense system), however likewise increasing resilience in the food sector, which becomes part of it (nationwide security). The Defense Minister has actually currently sent the expense calculations and the amount of spending plan required to develop a food estate in Kapuas and Pulang Pisau,” Jokowi said.
” The Minister of Farming will back it (the job). Other agricultural and food associated matters still come under the authority of the Farming Minister,” Jokowi kept in mind.
The food estate is not meant as a rice field opening program, however refers to the development of a food center, discussed Dahnil Anzar Simanjuntak, spokesperson for the Defense Minister.
The food estate will function as a center for agricultural and tactical logistical reserves, which are crucial for supporting nationwide defense.
Rice, centers of other crops, such as cassava and corn, will also be developed, depending on land conditions, the Defense Minister’s spokesperson stated.
As a tactical logistics reserve that is required to support nationwide defense, the food estate will help the Ministry of Agriculture and the National Logistics Agency, if there is a disturbance in food supply at any time, he described.
The food estate will be utilized to develop nationwide food reserves, which would be dispersed across Indonesia when needed.
The Defense Ministry has been charged by President Joko Widodo to carry out the program to develop the food estate in accordance with Law No. 3 of 2002 on National Defense.
Article 6 of the law states, “State defense is performed through efforts to develop and foster the capability of the deterrent power of the state and country, and to conquer any dangers.”
” We at the Ministry of Defense comprehend that the hazards include military, non-military, and hybrid dangers,” the spokesperson stated.
Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs Airlangga Hartarto had previously said that the food estate program is sustainable and will benefit the nation.
The farming increase program will cover 10,594 hectares of transmigration area in 55 villages.
To support the program, the Public Functions and Public Real Estate (PUPR) Ministry plans to upgrade the irrigation network over 165 thousand hectares of land in Central Kalimantan, according to Minister Basuki Hadimuljono.
Some 165 thousand hectares of the location has actually already been prepared as an irrigated paddy field, of which just 85,500 hectares was used as efficient land.
” Last week, we had actually gone to the location in addition to wetland experts. The 59,200 hectares of efficient land had only produced 1.7-2.9 tons of rice per hectare,” he explained.
The minister opined that the low performance was owing to an inefficient watering system that prevented the flow of water and ideal fertilizer absorption, combined with reoccurring flooding in the swampy location.
The rehabilitation task, to be conducted in stages from 2020 to 2022, will cover a location of 1,210 ha in 2020, 33,335 ha in 2021, and 22,655 ha in2022 A budget of Rp4972 billion has been assigned for the job.
Hadimuljono highlighted the significance of food durability as part of non-military defense. To this end, the Defense Minister will mobilize youth, with competence in the fields of computer and farming, he stated.
The PUPR Ministry had previously targeted to restore 165 thousand hectares of land as a food estate in Central Kalimantan from 2020 to 2022 as part of a bid to build nationwide food resilience.
The food estate is anticipated to reach optimum production by 2022, according to the PUPR Minister.
The federal government has chosen to develop the food estate in Pulang Pisau district in Central Kalimantan province at the website of a failed mega-peatland development task (PLG).
The PLG job, launched by the late president Suharto in 1995 as a way to guarantee Indonesia’s rice self-sufficiency, devastated a huge area of peat-swamp forests in the province.
The State Enterprises Ministry and Agriculture Ministry will now jointly establish a food estate on the site.
The PUPR Ministry will establish standard centers, consisting of revitalizing the irrigation system, while the State Enterprises Ministry and the Agriculture Ministry will develop farming technology to increase production.
Agriculture Minister Syahrul Yasin Limpo said the food estate program will use modern-day farming technology.
President Jokowi has stated that the land identified for the food estate project is not a peatland, but consists of alluvial soil, so the job would not be destructive to the environment.
The ecological impact of the task has, in truth, become an issue for several celebrations.
Syarief Hasan, a senior political leader of the Democratic Celebration and deputy chairman of individuals’s Consultative Assembly (MPR), recently prompted the federal government to reassess its food estate program in Central Kalimantan.
” The federal government has chosen to develop the food estate program in the previous Peat Land Development (PLG) location in Central Kalimantan. The area was when established during the Soeharto administration, and it only triggered ecological damage and a state loss,” Syarief Hasan said recently.
Pricing estimate the results of a research study by the Agricultural Technical Science of the University of Gadjah Mada, Hasan said the soil in the location has broken down in the last 25 years, and it does not have capability to support optimum plant development.
He advised the government to make a thorough and detailed research study by involving specialists and academicians.
Hasan is likewise of the view that the Defense Minister has a heavier job than establishing the food estate program, namely developing the domestic defense market and enhancing the national defense system, amidst the tensions in between China and the United States in the South China Sea, which shares a maritime border with Indonesia’s North Natuna Sea.
The Agriculture Ministry need to be leading the food estate program due to the fact that it is the most appropriate ministry to reinforce the country’s food resilience, he opined.
Associated news: Defense minister also charged with improving food resilience: Jokowi
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