Agricultural Intensification in Indonesia: Outside Pressures and Indigenous Strategies

Abstract

Extremely high population densities conventionally demand a preliminary look at intensification in Java, in both lowland and upland agriculture. However, the major focus of this paper is on intensification processes under more moderate population pressure on the islands outside Java. Government initiatives during the Suharto era often constrained land use decisions at local level. Of particular importance were restrictive forest classifications and intrusion by outside companies into the lands of indigenous groups. Timber plantations and oil palm estates occupied large areas, thus forcing intensification of swidden agriculture. Elaboration of this concept of ‘forced intensification ’ examines the impacts on local systems and notes indigenous responses of compliance or resistance. The processes of independent intensification have revolved around the move from dryland swidden to managed agroforest, sometimes with accompanying wet rice. Government slowness in recognising agroforests, plus the commodity export boom during the economic crisis, have tended to favour monocultures over more complex systems. Recent price declines, exposing monoculture vulnerability, are encouraging a return to mixed tree crops. A final section examines intensification in response to a niche market, as a tourism industry which values the pseudo‐cultural images evoked by indigenous roof thatch has induced intensive management of Imperata grass in Bali and Lombok.