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ustomary villages and temples in Bali have been granted land certificates by the central government to protect them from land disputes as part of President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo’s ambitious agrarian reform program.

Jokowi, on a working visit to Bali, handed over land certificates for 41,657 plots in Bali to 185 customary villages across the island, which included certificates for 845 assets belonging to temples in an event in Denpasar on Friday afternoon.

Earlier on the same day, he also handed over 15,000 land certificates to individuals at Margarana National Monument Park in Tabanan.

“The customary village is the major platform of culture in Bali. It is impossible for the Balinese to maintain their culture without customary villages. Therefore, we should be taking a role in maintaining and strengthening customary villages,” Jokowi told customary villages chiefs.

Jokowi said he had been informed that many customary villages in Bali had yet to receive land certificates.

“Bali will be the first province that will have all of its land plots certified,” he continued.

There are a total of 1.8 million land plots in Bali, of which 1.3 million have been certified.

Jokowi reiterated that his administration would continue to speed up the granting of land certificates to residents in order to support ownership by local residents as well as to prevent land conflicts. Many local residents had complained of having weak positions in land disputes with regional administrations or business entities. As part of his 2014 presidential campaign, Jokowi pledged to settle land conflicts through the agrarian reform program.

The government aims to issue 7 million land certificates this year, following the 5 million that were issued last year. The target for 2018 is 9 million land certificates issued by the National Land Agency (BPN).

Agrarian and Spatial Planning Minister Sofyan Djalil who accompanied the President said the customary villages in Bali had land assets that were used for many cultural purposes and could not be sold.

“Previously, the status of the land was not clear. With the land certificates for the customary villages, any disputes can be settled,” he said.

Chairman of the Grand Council of Customary Villages (MUDP), Jero Gede Putus Suwena Upadesa welcomed the certificate-issuance saying that residents had been waiting for the distribution for a long time.

“It was 2007 when we wrote our first letter urging the central government to give customary villages the right to communal land ownership. And now we’ve got the answer,” Suwena said.

Bali’s village structure is different from many other provinces in Indonesia. The island has strong cultural roots with a total of 1,493 customary villages, which are unlike administrative villages. A customary village is a unit for the purposes of adat (customary law) where the community is based on custom and tradition.

Customary villages are regarded as the most powerful traditional institutions on the island, wielding significant influence over their members because of their important role in organizing religious and customary rituals, both at the family and village levels.

Each customary village across Bali has land assets used for many things such as traditional community halls, temples, or plots of land for productive farming. Many villages also rent the plots of land for commercial purposes to fund their village activities.