O

ct. 16 was World Food Day, a day intended to highlight problems of food security. Although most Indonesians rely on agriculture for their livelihoods, this has not necessarily meant that Indonesia has been able to achieve food security for its entire population. This is especially true for indigenous people such as those living in Jambi, Sumatra.

The Orang Rimba live in small colonies of tribal communities, eking a living by hunting and gathering forest products and wildlife. Jambi province itself used to have vast stretches of rain forest, which have suffered severe degradation.

 This has been attributed to rapid growth-focused development, poor forestry management practices since the 1970s that promoted plantation crops such as rubber, palm oil and coffee, increased accessibility through the construction of infrastructure, transmigrant settlements, illegal and legal logging and slash-and-burn subsistence cultivation practices.

The Orang Rimba have long faced chronic food insecurity. Their only asset, the natural forest, is no longer large enough to meet their food needs all year round. Food gathering and hunting activities no longer bring sufficient foodstuff as swathes of natural forests have been signed away by the government to both private and state-owned plantations plus the other above-mentioned factors.

The desire on behalf of the government to extricate the Orang Rimba from retardation into civilization, has not overcome the problem, if anything, it has instead aggravated it.

This is because some programs, such as relocation and resettlement projects, are seen as government efforts to confine the Orang Rimba to certain locations to enable their easy access to public services such as health, education, sanitation and other drivers of development. However, the government forgets that the Orang Rimba'€™s habitat is nowhere other than the forests.

Apparently, several programs seem to be underpinned by the desire to compensate them for their loss of forest, when actually their loss is worse '€” their irreplaceable livelihood and existence.

A number of times the government'€™s Social Affairs Office have provided the Orang Rimba living in the Bukit Duabelas area with housing made of permanent building materials and fields to grow their crops. In addition, a capacity-building program aimed at improving their food security was held for those living in the Air Hitam region. The program entailed distributing cattle, goats and sheep to the Orang Rimba.

Yet the program was misplaced since Orang Rimba traditions proscribe them from living in permanent houses as well as rearing livestock. The program must have been implemented without prior communication with them. Consequently, the Orang Rimba sold the donated homes and cattle to others. Thus, by and large, the Orang Rimba regard the role of the government as far from their expectations.

It is vital to understand the difference in the way the Orang Rimba perceive food security from the viewpoint held by the mainstream majority, which explains why programs initiated to improve food security so far have ended up compounding the situation rather than providing solutions.

For the Orang Rimba food security is part and parcel of cultural security. Efforts at ensuring food security still focus on mainstream society, while the indigenous people are expected to learn to catch up with what is going on, without allowing them to participate in policy formulation, implementation, monitoring or evaluation.

Food security for the Orang Rimba, who rely heavily on forests, is only possible if their only source of livelihood is preserved. Thus adequate forest habitats that provide means of living for these people must remain available for them to continue as much as possible their age-old lifestyles such as food-gathering practices.

And reducing deforestation would not only benefit the Orang Rimba in Jambi, but also the entire population due to the function of forests for water catchments, a source of herbs, mitigating soil erosion and to help curb global warming.

Nonetheless, efforts at counselling the communities to assuage some of the values that hamper their capacity to achieve food security such as taboos, must continue, but with an orientation toward ensuring food security rather than attracting them to become members of the civilized flock and '€œgood citizens'€.

Educating them in ways that enhance their understanding, not necessarily, adopting, values from outside should help them live side-by-side with people they consider strangers.

The same also applies to outside communities, who should be educated on the sacred values of the indigenous people, to have a better understanding about their outlook on life, customs and traditions.

This would reduce condescension, discrimination, cases of manipulation of indigenous people and mutual suspicion, which have kept mainstream and minority communities apart.

Cultural engagement would go a long way to help the marginalized communities adjust to the new changes facing them, without causing mayhem and discordance, as has been the case in Jambi.