Agroecological Challenges in Three Agricultural Development Areas in Aceh

Abstract

Agroecological zones group an area on soil and climate differences that interact with crops will have impact on differences in commodities, farming systems, productivity, and farmers’ challenges in managing their agricultural businesses. Aceh Province which is grouped into 3 Agroecological Zones, namely the southwest coast, middle and northeast coasts have different agricultural characteristics. This descriptive research tries to answer the challenges of farmers in managing agricultural businesses in 3 different Agroecological Zones. The results showed that in the southwest zone there were 9 challenges, and in the middle zone there were 10 challenges faced by farmers. The main challenges in these two zones is that agricultural development assistance such as capital, superior seeds, production inputs, counseling, and program supervision is not appropriate and complete. In the northeast zone, there are 13 challenges with the main challenges was the difficulty of farmers in getting subsidized fertilizers. Synchronization of agricultural development programs with the challenges faced by farmers based on the ZAE area is very important, because it will be a more precise and simpler solution to solving agricultural challenges in agricultural-based regional development.