Jakarta – Hundreds of farmers from around the country staged a rally here Tuesday to protest against the government's plan to import 210,000 kilograms of rice, which they said could destroy their livelihood.
The demonstrators thronged the House of Representatives building to voice their opposition to the planned imports, which the government said were necessary to maintain rice stocks at the State Logistics Agency (Bulog).
They threatened to bar the entry of the imported rice at some ports in Aceh and North Sumatra. "The import plan is only a ploy devised by middlemen to enrich themselves," said Indonesian Farmers Federation (FSPI) secretary-general Henry Saragih.
The protesting farmers hailed from some of the country's biggest rice-supplying regions, such as West Java's Karawang, Cirebon and Kuningan, Central Java's Batang and West Nusa Tenggara's Mataram.
Later, in a meeting with members of House Commission IV on agriculture and forestry, their representatives said the rice imports would deal a severe blow to small farmers.
"Even news about the import plan has already brought down the price of unhulled rice in our regions," said Deden, a farmer from Karawang.
He said unhulled rice is currently selling for Rp 2,000 (22 US cents) per kilogram in Karawang, compared to Rp 2,700 per kilogram before the news about the planned imports circulated.
Responding to the farmers' demands, Commission IV member Bomer Pasaribu of the Golkar Party said the import plan was evidence that the government has failed miserably to maintain the food sustainability the country attained in the late 1980s.
"It's high time the government gave incentives to farmers so that we can once again achieve sustainability and not resort to imports," Bomer said.
Separately, an international coalition of farmers, La Via Campesina, urged developing countries to implement genuine agrarian reforms with farmer-based agricultural management that would allow those producing the crops to fully control the use of land, seeds, water and technology.
The demand was one of numerous proposals made during the coalition's international conference last weekend in Jakarta. The conference was one of the events held to protest the World Bank-International Monetary Fund (IMF) meeting in Singapore.
"The involvement of multinational companies, IMF and the World Bank in agricultural policies has caused an increase in production costs and only makes us suffer," D.R. Jayatilake of Sri Lanka's Movement for National Land and Agriculture Reforms told The Jakarta Post.
Jayatilake, who is a farmer from Kurunegala district in southern Sri Lanka, said he has been campaigning for "going back to traditional farming" using organic seeds rather than hybrid crops produced by big international corporations.
Via Campesina, consisting of farmers and activists from Asia, America and Europe, was established in 1993 to coordinate farmers' organizations, agricultural workers, rural women and indigenous communities.
Two Via Campesina activists from Indonesia, Achmad Ya'kub and Irma Yanni, were among those arrested Monday by Singapore authorities at Changi International Airport. They were deported to Jakarta on Tuesday.
The two were accused of posing threats to the neighboring country's security, although they argued that they were only planning to organize a news conference there for the coalition.