Barriers to and opportunities for the use of forage tree legumes in smallholder cattle fattening systems in Eastern Indonesia

Abstract

Forage tree legumes (FTL) have existed in the Eastern Indonesian landscape since colonial traders introduced several species in the late 1800s. A specific effort was made to establish leucaena (Leucaena leucocephala) and sesbania (Sesbania grandiflora) for use as forage for cattle fattening at Amarasi in East Nusa Tenggara Province and Central Lombok in West Nusa Tenggara, in the 1970s (Yuksel et al. 1999; Dahlanuddin and Shelton 2005). Their spread within these provinces as potential forage to intensi-fy cattle fattening systems, however, has been slow, if not stagnant. In preparation for intensified efforts to encourage farmers in East and West Nusa Tenggara to grow and use FTLs for cattle fattening, we asked the question why suc-cessful FTL feeding practices by some communities had not spread widely to adjacent areas within the provinces. A situation analysis study was conducted in 2011/12 in East and West Nusa Tenggara Provinces; it aimed at identifying the barriers to and opportunities for FTL use in smallholder cattle fattening systems. This paper describes the method-ology of this study, its main findings and the implications for follow-up expansion of FTL innovations.