The Fruits and Vegetables Industry in Indonesia: Production and Limited Access to Market

Smallholder producers of fruits and vegetables in the Nanggung sub-district of West Java, Indonesia practice a multicropping system of agriculture on less than two acres of land. Agricultural practices in this area are still crude, with little or no inputs such as fertilization or modern irrigation. When water is available, the furrow irrigation system is used at best. Although banana is one of the income-generating crops, farmers grow it in combination with other fruits such as durian, mangosteen, rambutan, jackfruit, and with vegetables such as chili peppers, tomatoes, sweet corn, and green beans under non-intensive management. Although market-survey reports show that the demand for these fruits and vegetables is greater than the supply, the farmers not only have limited access to markets but produce inferior quality and limited quantity (Fonsah 2003). Due to these limitations, this study is aimed at developing new markets, creating new distribution systems and market channels, and seeks ways to improve those already existing.Agribusiness, Crop Production/Industries, Marketing,

Oil palm plantations in Indonesia: The implications for migration, settlement/resettlement and local economic development

5. Concluding remarks It is not difficult for policy makers to show that oil palms are an economically rentable crop with a huge potential for further economic growth. In addition to national demands, the growing worldwide interest in biofuels as an alternative to fossil fuels will increase demand for its feedstock and lead to the expansion of oil palm plantations in climatically suitable regions. On the basis of a cost–benefit analysis of various crops, oil palm will probably continue to be seen as a highly profitable crop with interesting possibilities for being promoted as a source of ‘green’ development. The Indonesian population has increasingly been attracted by this crop, as it provides them with opportunities to benefit and multiply their incomes, which will in itself provide capital for improving consumption and having a good life. At the same time, however, Riau shows us that there are environmental costs (deforestation, invasion into peat land areas etc.) and that oil palm expansion is accompanied by rapid immigration and urbanization. Even though policy attempts are made to control land conversion or to stop deforestation, much of what is happening today cannot easily be regulated. It is not the direct effects (i.e. the expansion of plantations and production) but the indirect effects and multipliers that bring into question the long-term sustainability of the development model. The establishment of new settlements, rapid urbanization and continuing immigration will require additional employment opportunities. And along with the growing population and the conversion of rice lands into oil palm fields, food security issues will increasingly become a problem. Rather than making quick money from oil palm production, the Indonesian government should make efforts to better control the indirect effects and especially to investigate the problem how to make oil palm-based economies more sustainable and equitable in the longer term. Without interventions – and with today’s laissez-faire approach – further oil palm expansion will soon lead to the depletion of natural resources and an increase in social tensions as a result of unemployment and food insecurity

Impact of cropping methods on biodiversity in coffee agroecosystems in Sumatra, Indonesia

The sustainable management of biodiversity and productivity in forested lands requires an understanding of key interactions between socioeconomic and biophysical factors and their response to environmental change. Appropriate baseline data are rarely available. As part of a broader study on biodiversity and profitability, we examined the impact of different cropping methods on biodiversity (plant species richness) along a subjectively determined land-use intensity gradient in southern Sumatra, ranging from primary and secondary forest to coffee-farming systems (simple, complex, with and without shade crops) and smallholder coffee plantings, at increasing levels of intensity. We used 24 (40 x 5 m) plots to record site physical data, including soil nutrients and soil texture together with vegetation structure, all vascular plant species, and plant functional types (PFTs—readily observable, adaptive, morphological features). Biodiversity was lowest under simple, intensive, non-shaded farming systems and increased progressively through shaded and more complex agroforests to late secondary and closed-canopy forests. The most efficient single indicators of biodiversity and soil nutrient status were PFT richness and a derived measure of plant functional complexity. Vegetation structure, tree dry weight, and duration of the land-use type, to a lesser degree, were also highly correlated with biodiversity. Together with a vegetation, or V index, the close correspondence between these variables and soil nutrients suggests they are potentially useful indicators of coffee production and profitability across different farming systems. These findings provide a unique quantitative basis for a subsequent study of the nexus between biodiversity and profitability

Agricultural intensification, deforestation, and the environment: assessing tradeoffs in Sumatra, Indonesia

The key hypotheses underlying ASB research in Indonesia has been intensifying land use as an alternative to slash and burn can simultaneously reduce deforestation and reduce poverty. The intensification hypothesis hinges on the existence of opportunities to raise the productivity of smallholder systems at the forest margins without degrading forest function. Estimates of returns to land and labor presented in this chapter indicate that from a purely private perspective, returns to forest conversion are high in Sumatra's peneplains. Because all derived land uses are inferior to natural forest, based on global environmental concerns, ASB research in Indonesia has shown that land use changes involve tradeoffs between these environmental concerns and the objectives of poverty alleviation and national development. If there is no action on these tradeoffs, by identifying workable options either to change incentives for conversion or to restrict access to the remaining natural forests, thus rain forests will continue to disappear. This research also provides evidence that land-use alternatives differ significantly in their ability to substitute for the global environmental services provided by natural forests. So, although forest conversion has the largest negative effect on these environmental services, the alternative land uses matter too. Carbon stocks are similar for long rotation tree-based systems, which are superior to all other land uses by this criterion except for natural forest themselves. Similarly, alternative land uses also differ significantly in their potential for biodiversity conservation, ranging between the extremes of smallholder ’complex, multistrata agroforestry systems and large-scale plantation monoculture. While there may be a tradeoff between potential profitability and biodiversity in tree-based production systems, this requires further verification. There may be little or no tradeoff between policy makers' objectives and those of smallholder households appears to be comparable to that of large-scale estates, however, this also requires further verification. There are also important institutional questions that must be addressed to enable widespread adoption of profitable alternatives by smallholders. To obtain estimates of regional or global impacts directly from measures, it is necessary to assume independence and hence addivity across space. This assumption is reasonable for some measure, but it is only a rough approximation for others. Among these measures biodiversity is the most sensitive to scaling issues. While the agronomic sustainability measure used here concerns only on-site, field level effects, the extent and spatial arrangement of land-use alternatives also produce environmental externalities. One of the key challenges of future research is to be able to asses these phenomena at the landscape level. Ultimately, instead of single land-use system or technology, the most attractive way to achieve the multiple objectives is likely to come from combinations of complementary land-use practices within a varied landscape

The Fruits and Vegetables Industry in Indonesia: Production and Limited Access to Market

Smallholder producers of fruits and vegetables in the Nanggung sub-district of West Java, Indonesia practice a multicropping system of agriculture on less than two acres of land. Agricultural practices in this area are still crude, with little or no inputs such as fertilization or modern irrigation. When water is available, the furrow irrigation system is used at best. Although banana is one of the income-generating crops, farmers grow it in combination with other fruits such as durian, mangosteen, rambutan, jackfruit, and with vegetables such as chili peppers, tomatoes, sweet corn, and green beans under non-intensive management. Although market-survey reports show that the demand for these fruits and vegetables is greater than the supply, the farmers not only have limited access to markets but produce inferior quality and limited quantity (Fonsah 2003). Due to these limitations, this study is aimed at developing new markets, creating new distribution systems and market channels, and seeks ways to improve those already existing