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Govt to allocate 8 million ha of land to support free meals, reach food self-sufficiency
Forestry Minister Raja Juli Antoni said the land, which has been redistributed to and is managed by farmers and communities of farmers, would be used to achieve the targets of President Prabowo Subianto’s food self-sufficiency and free nutritious meals programs.
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Members of farmers' group Maju Bersama, Liswanti (left), Lisnawati (second left), Herawati and Purwani (right) pose with their harvest of kecombrang (torch ginger) in Kerinci Seblat National Park in Bengkulu in December 2019. (JP/Dedek Hendry)
T
he government has said it will use 8 million hectares of land currently under the social forestry program to increase the country’s food production and achieve food self-sufficiency.
Forestry Minister Raja Juli Antoni said the land, which has been redistributed to and is managed by farmers and communities of farmers, would be used to achieve the targets of President Prabowo Subianto’s food self-sufficiency and free nutritious meals programs.
“The 8 million ha of land can be directed toward the work of the National Nutrition Agency,” he said on Tuesday after meeting the agency’s head Dadan Hindayana.
Raja Juli said social forestry could serve as “the backbone” of the food self-sufficiency program.
“We at the Forestry Ministry support Pak Prabowo’s grand vision for food self-sufficiency and a free nutritious meals program,” he said.
Read also: Young farmers unlikely stay despite govt’s big pay promise for newcomers
Initiated by the government in the 1990s, the social forestry program is a forest management system in which the government grants permits to communities to manage forests in various forms, including hutan kemasyarakatan (community forests), hutan desa (village forests), hutan tanaman rakyat (community plantation forests) and hutan adat (customary forests) and to form partnerships for collaborative forest management. The program includes degraded land as well land that has been utilized by communities as sources of food and income across generations.
