TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Around 80 percent of Indonesian farmers are aged 50 and above, according to the People's Coalition for Food Sovereignty (KRKP).
"If we are to categorise Indonesian farmers based on their age groups, then in 2014 around 61.8 percent are aged 45 and older, 26 percent are aged between 35 to 44 years, while only 12 percent are younger than 35 years old," said KRKP's Manager for Advocacy and Networking, Said Abdullah in Jakarta, during a discussion with journalists on the role of youth in developing Indonesia's agricultural sector.
According to Said, the combination of increasing average age of farmers, and their declining numbers will result in an overall decline in Indonesia's domestic agricultural output. These factors need to be addressed as it is counter-intuitive to President Joko Widodo's target to achieve food sovereignty in the very near future.
"The low participation rate of youths in the agricultural sector is not a new phenomenon, as this has been going on for a while and it remains unaddressed to this day," said Said.
According to Said, in order to drive youth to participate in the agricultural sector, the government needs to lead efforts to shift the youth's way of thinking - especially in areas relating to income and future prospects.
"Farming and agriculture is seen by many as an unpromising sector - that farmers have to be content with bleak futures, grappling with poverty and losses," explained Said.
As a result, younger generations of workers tend to look away from the agricultural sector - gravitating towards urban centres where incomes are higher and job security can be more easily found, which contributes to the unequal distribution of growth and development.
"Minimal government investment as well as intervention has culminated in the minimal interest among youth to join the agricultural sector," said Said, who used the example of the declining numbers of agricultural schools to the point of near-absence, as well as the absence of government initiative to address these facts.
"Every stakeholder in the nation - especially the government - needs to work together to provide a solution to this issue, as the risk would be immense if we let the matter progress to the point where there are no one who are capable and/or willing to work in the agricultural sector," said Said.
ANTARA NEWS | HENDRINA KANDIPI | ADE MARBOEN
