In 1965, Indonesia experienced an economic and political crisis resulting in high inflation and soaring food prices. Thus, the economists sought to control inflation by controlling rice prices.

As a result of inflation money lost its value, so a policy was made for civil servants to receive payment partly in rice rations throughout Indonesia, except for eastern Indonesia, such as Papua and Maluku, where they ate sago. They were given sago in place of rice.

Leaders in eastern Indonesia protested the perceived discrimination. Therefore, a policy of national rice acquisition was born. Policies were pushed to increase rice production and distribution, development and selection of seeds and fertilizers, all for the sake of rice.

Rice became akin to God and led Indonesia to rice self-sufficiency in 1986, for which the United Nation’s Food and Agricultural Organization gave Indonesia a standing ovation.

However, experts criticized the rice policy. Other crops that were sources of food were disappearing amid the abundant paddy fields. However, for the economists, food development by specializing in rice was considered correct. At that time I didn’t know the meaning of biodiversity or the environment.

In 1972, I attended the 1972 UN Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm. Everyone was saying the environment needed to be protected. I couldn’t stop thinking about the fate of food development, which needed land, if deforestation stopped.